1st LD-Writethru: Xi-Ma meeting "milestone" for cross-Strait relations
Xinhua, November 4, 2015 Adjust font size:
The Taiwan affairs chief of the Chinese mainland said here Wednesday that the scheduled meeting between Xi Jinping and Ma Ying-jeou is a "milestone" for cross-Strait relations, breaking through in direct exchange and communication between the two leaders.
Zhang Zhijun, head of the Taiwan Work Office of the Communist Party of China Central Committee and the Taiwan Affairs Office of the State Council, said the meeting in Singapore on Saturday would help enhance trust across the Taiwan Strait, consolidate common political grounds, push forward peaceful development of cross-Strait relations and safeguard peace and stability in the region.
The meeting comes at a key moment of the cross-Strait relationship, which again is at the crossroads, according to Zhang.
As people on both sides hope the relations remain peaceful and stable and bring greater welfare to the people, the meeting between the two leaders will be a significant move that complies with the people's wish and the trend of the time, Zhang said
The meeting will lift the exchange and interaction between the two sides to a new level and will create new space for the development of cross-Strait relations, he said.
The move will promote communication and mutual trust between the two sides, help manage conflicts and divergences, consolidate common political grounds, promote peaceful development of cross-Strait relations, and help safeguard peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait and in the region, he said.
"I believe the meeting will gain wide support from all walks of life across the Strait and the international community," Zhang said.
In April 1993, Wang Daohan, then head of the Chinese mainland's Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Straits (ARATS), and Koo Chen-fu, then chairman of Taiwan's Straits Exchange Foundation (SEF), held a meeting in Singapore, establishing a mechanism for promoting institutional consultations between the two sides on the basis of "one-China" principle.
In February last year, the Taiwan Affairs Office of the State Council and Taiwan's mainland affairs office set up a regular communication mechanism between the two departments, which has helped solve many problems in cross-Strait exchanges appropriately, Zhang said. Endi