Reuters, Beijing :
Chinese President Xi Jinping called on Taiwan’s business community on Tuesday to shun any idea of independence for their island and to promote peace and stable ties with the mainland, state media reported.
Ties between Beijing and self-ruled Taiwan have been frosty since the independence-leaning Diplomatic Progressive Party (DPP) won a Taiwan election in 2016, defeating the nationalist Kuomintang party. Beijing views Taiwan as a breakaway province and has never renounced the use of force to bring it under Chinese control. “Friends in the island’s business community should take a stand and firmly maintain the ‘1992 consensus’, oppose ‘Taiwan independence’ and firmly promote the peace and stability of cross-straits relations,” Xi told the chairman of a foundation that promotes trade between China and Taiwan.
The “1992 consensus” refers to an agreement reached that year that both sides are part of “one China”, a cherished principle in Beijing.
Xi made the remarks to Vincent Siew, a former vice-president of Taiwan when it was under Kuomintang rule and head of the Taiwan-based Cross-Straits Common Market Foundation, on the sidelines of the Chinese Boao Forum for Asia on Hainan island.
“The Taiwan problem is of great concern for the basic interests of the Chinese nation,” Xi told Siew, according to a report of their talk from the official People’s Daily newspaper.
“We hope that compatriots across the straights can together shoulder the virtuous cause of the nation and push for the peaceful reunification of the motherland.” Xi said in a speech to China’s annual meeting of parliament in March that Taiwan would face the “punishment of history” for any attempts at separatism, his strongest on the issue warning yet.
