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TAOYUAN, Taiwan: China and Taiwan resumed regular direct flights
Friday for the first time in six decades, ushering in what Beijing
called a “new start” in their tense and testy relations.
In the most visible sign yet of a new openness
toward the mainland under new Taiwanese President Ma Ying-jeou, the
two sides—which split in 1949 after a civil war—welcomed
passenger flights directly from each other’s territory.
“This is a sacred moment,” said Liu Shaoyong,
chairman of China Southern Airlines, who piloted the first flight
from the southern Chinese city of Guangzhou to Taiwan himself.
“Flying over the strait to Taiwan is like
coming home,” he told a crowd of well-wishers at the airport
welcoming ceremony. “It feels good.”
The 100 Chinese tourists aboard got the
red-carpet treatment on arrival, including jets of water shooting
over the plane, to symbolize the cleaning of dusty travelers, as
well as a traditional Chinese “lion dance.”
“We were lucky to be on the plane,” said
Wang Yu, a businessman from Zhuhai in southern China. “Many people
were fighting for seats on the inaugural flight.”
Ties between Taiwan and China have always been
better than the public hostility from the two sides has
acknowledged, and trade between them last year was more than $100
billion.
But officially, China sees Taiwan as its
territory waiting to be reclaimed by force if needed—and the
Strait, heavily armed on both sides, has long been one of the
world’s most dangerous potential military flashpoints.
Taiwan banned direct trade and transport links
following its split from the communist mainland, but Ma’s election
opened the door to warmer ties after an especially frosty period
under his pro-independence predecessor Chen Shui-bian.
The two sides held their first direct talks in a
decade last month.
Those talks led to the flights agreement—a
deal that, for four days a week at least, will eliminate the
time-consuming stopovers in Hong Kong or elsewhere that have been
the bane of travelers between the two sides.
“Today is a new start in the history of
exchanges between the two sides,” Wang Yi, director of China’s
Taiwan Affairs Office, said in Beijing.
“At present, cross-Strait relations are facing
a rare opportunity for development,” Wang said.
Changes have been rapid since Ma took office.
Taiwan banks can now exchange Chinese currency,
limits on Taiwanese investment on the mainland have been eased, and
some Chinese media outlets which had been banned on the island now
have clearance to work.
There will be 36 round-trip flights across the
Taiwan Strait weekly, operating from Friday to Monday between six
Taiwanese airports and five on the mainland.
The service will meet growing demand after
Taiwan allowed up to 3,000 visitors a day from China, giving a
much-needed boost to the island’s sluggish economy.
More than 700 Chinese in 26 tour groups were to
arrive Friday from Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou and two other
cities, while nine flights were set from China to Taiwan.
“I am thrilled to take the first
mainland-bound flight in this new charter service,” said Zhou Wan-rong,
chairman of the student association of Chinghua University in
Taiwan.
Representative Donald C.T. Lee of the Taipei
Economic and Cultural Office in Manila likened today’s milestone
to an astronaut stepping on the moon for the first time.
“It’s a big step for both sides to develop
closer relations,” he told The Manila Times.
-- AFP With The Manila Times
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