|
TAIPEI: Taiwan’s vice president-elect will head to
China this week and could meet with President Hu Jintao, his
spokesman said Sunday, amid optimism about improving ties between
the cross-strait rivals.
Vincent Siew will head on Friday
to Hainan Island in southern China for the Boao Forum for Asia, a
gathering of business people and officials focused on greater trade
cooperation in Asia, his spokesman Wang Yu-chi told Agence France-Presse.
Siew will attend the weekend
forum in his capacity as the chief of a nonprofit organization he
founded, Wang said.
When asked if Siew would meet the
Chinese president, the spokesman said: “It is not certain if Mr.
Siew will meet with Hu. Details of Mr. Siew’s itinerary have not
yet been finalized.”
The Taipei-based China Times had
quoted an unnamed Chinese official as saying that Hu—who will give
the opening address at the Boao meeting on Friday—could meet with
Siew on the sidelines of the forum.
The trip would come less than
three weeks after the landslide presidential victory in Taiwan of
the Kuomintang’s Ma Ying-jeou, who is seen as more China-friendly
than his pro-independence predecessor Chen Shui-bian.
Ties between Taipei and Beijing
hit new lows during Chen’s eight years in office, but expectations
have mounted since Ma’s victory on March 22 of an easing of
tensions, and a vast improvement in ties.
--AFP
|
