The Hindu : Taiwan flight makes first visit to China

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Monday, Jan 27, 2003

International

International

Taiwan flight makes first visit to China

By P. S. Suryanarayana

SINGAPORE Jan. 26 Heralding a new episode of contacts between China and Taiwan, a charter flight of a Taiwanese carrier, which styles itself as "China Airlines'', today carried passengers from Shanghai to Taipei, via Hong Kong though, for the first time since the inception of the People's Republic of China in Beijing in 1949.

The event was of considerable cultural symbolism for a possible political reunification of Taiwan with mainland China over time. However, today's flight itself was portrayed by both sides in realistic economic and cultural terms rather than in a political context of the future.

Over 240 Taiwanese, mostly business persons working in China, took today's flight, the first of a planned series of ad hoc services which will link Shanghai and Taipei via Hong Kong. The Taiwanese passengers went home for the Chinese New Year Spring Festival which falls on February 1 this year.

Given the political complexity of the Taiwan-China `ties', the Taiwanese aircraft, a jumbo jet, reached Shanghai from Taipei with no passengers at all on board. On the return journey, the airliner carried only Taiwanese passengers resident in China. Such two-way flights, numbering 16 and timed exclusively for the Chinese New Year holidays, will transport between 1000-1500 Taiwanese to Taipei first and bring them back to Shanghai after the holidays.

According to one estimate, about one million Taiwanese work in China, mostly in the business sector. Significantly in this context, no passage to Taiwan for the Chinese citizens themselves is planned under this project of friendship.

It was the decision of the Taiwanese authorities that these ad hoc flights should be routed through Hong Kong, which enjoys a unique political status within China at present, so that the diplomatic connotation of an absolutely `direct' link between Taipei and Shanghai could be avoided.

However, China saw today's development as a significant step towards a "direct link'' with or without a political momentum of its own.

Speaking at a seminar in Beijing ahead of this air-link diplomacy, the Chinese Vice-Premier, Qian Qichen, said that any talks between China and Taiwan on the modalities of opening "three direct links'' between them ``are not political'' in character. Such parleys could, therefore, steer clear of the political implications of the idea of "one China'', the eventual goal, it was underlined.

The proposition of "three direct links'' relates to two-way mail as also trade and transport services between China and Taiwan. Beijing's official line is that no political calculations should be allowed to impede the progress towards such `economic' links.

In diplomatic shorthand, China's position is an indictment of the perceived Taiwanese policy of tardiness towards an eventual reunification. Such tardiness is seen in the regional political-diplomatic circles as an aspect of Taipei's "offshore engagement strategy'' of arming Taiwan with an "offensive military capability''.

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