Chinese and Taiwanese presidents to meet for the first time

Taiwan’s President Ma Ying-jeou will meet his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping in Singapore on Saturday to discuss the issues concerned with relations across the Taiwan Strait.

Taiwan’s presidential office appreciated the initiative and said that this is for the first time the leaders of the two countries will meet since the end of the Chinese civil war in 1949. China claimed Taiwan as a part of its territory, on which it enjoyed complete sovereignty until the civil war ended.

The former has always warned Taiwan not to take any action to gain complete independence by military force. The relation between the two nations, however, has witnessed significant improvement since Ma took over as Taiwan’s president in 2008.

According to the BBC report, Taiwan’s spokesman Chen Yi-Hsin said that Ma’s aim was to strengthen the relationship between the two countries and “maintain status quo.” “No agreement will be signed, and no statement issued,” the spokesman said. He added that Ma will be holding a news conference on Thursday to explain his decision to meet the Chinese president.

Taiwan’s cabinet is about to meet with the parliament leaders and political parties on Wednesday to make necessary discussions regarding the trip to Singapore. China’s Taiwan Affairs Office will also hold a news conference on Wednesday. “The mainland’s attitude on a meeting between leaders from both sides of the Taiwan Strait is positive and consistent. If there is news on this, we will issue it in a timely manner,” Reuters reported the office as saying.

Taiwan presidential and legislative elections are scheduled on Jan. 16, which makes the meeting and its agenda a very sensitive matter for the Taiwanese.

In 1949, when the members of the Chinese Nationalist Party found that it is difficult to win the civil war against the Communist Party of China, it fled to the island of Taiwan. Since then, no Taiwan president has met with the Chinese top authority.

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