CHINESE WARSHIPS
Late Monday, Kuan Bi-ling, head of Taiwan’s Ocean Affairs Council, which runs the coast guard, posted a picture on her Facebook account of current Chinese warship deployments around the island – two off the east coast, and one each to the north, northwest and southwest.
“When you depart, you are doing so from within what they see as the ‘Taiwan cage’,” Kuan told reporters at parliament on Tuesday, referring to how China’s military has termed Taiwan’s planned T-Dome air defence system and talking about Cheng’s trip.
Speaking separately at parliament, Taiwan’s top official in charge of China policy, Mainland Affairs Council minister Chiu Chui-cheng, said Beijing should engage with Taiwan’s democratically elected and legitimate government.
“We call on Chairwoman Cheng Li-wun, when facing the Communist Party authorities in person, to demand that they immediately stop their compounded pressure against Taiwan, including military aircraft and naval harassment,” he added.
Cheng is going to China a month before US President Donald Trump’s scheduled summit with Xi in Beijing.
While Trump and Xi could strike goodwill agreements in Beijing on trade in agriculture and aircraft parts, they are also expected to discuss areas of deep tension, such as Taiwan, where little progress is expected.
In a February call, Xi told Trump that the US “must carefully handle arms sales to Taiwan”.
This is the first trip by a KMT leader to China in a decade, though China has yet to confirm whether Xi will definitely meet Cheng, who will be in Beijing from Thursday.
She flies first to Shanghai and then takes a train to Nanjing, home to the mausoleum of party founder Sun Yat-sen, who overthrew the last imperial government and founded the Republic of China in 1912.
The KMT-led republican government fled to Taiwan in 1949 after losing a civil war with Mao Zedong’s communists.
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