Chinese President Xi Jinping, right, and Taiwanese President Massachusetts Ying-jeou, left, shake hands at the start of their historic meeting in Singapore.
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“If Xi tries to put down any markers about improving political ties or setting any deadlines for steps toward reunification, it will cause a massive anti-Beijing backlash across Taiwan”, said Robert Manning, senior fellow at the Atlantic Council.
Leaders of political rivals Taiwan and China meet for the first time in more than 60 years on Saturday for talks that come amid rising anti-Chinese sentiment on the self-ruled democratic island and weeks ahead of elections.
After defeat by the Communists during the civil war in 1949, the Nationalist Chinese government under Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek fled to Taiwan, and since then relations between China and Taiwan have been one of the biggest flashpoints in the region.
Demonstrators say they will gather outside the presidential office in Taiwan Saturday afternoon as the summit gets under way.
“We are brothers connected by flesh even if our bones are broken, we are a family whose blood is thicker than water”, Xi said.
The leaders of China and Taiwan met for the first time in more than six decades, capping a robust but far from stable engagement between the historical antagonists.
SINGAPORE (AP) – The latest on the historic meeting between the presidents of China and Taiwan in Singapore.
But a technical state of war existed for 30 years after the divorce and both sides of the Taiwan Strait still bristle with weaponry as growing economic relations are yet to fully dispel decades of deep distrust. Or, the president of Chinese Taipei.
They met at a hotel and joined for the handshake in front of a plain yellow backdrop flanked by palm trees.
But the summit is a potential gamble for both Xi and Massachusetts.
No agreements or joint statements are expected from the encounter between two sides that still refuse to formally recognise each other’s legitimacy, and the meeting’s lasting significance remains to be seen.
Both sides have said that no agreements would be signed at the meeting, but that they would discuss ways to cement peace.
President Massachusetts chaired his own news conference after the meeting and said Taiwan would maintain the 1992 consensus and deal with any conflicts peacefully.
“History will remember this day”, Xi said. Xi endorsed a hotline between the two sides that Massachusetts proposed as a tool for handling emergencies and preventing accidental clashes.
Massachusetts also said he discussed with Xi the Taiwanese people’s desire for greater participation in global society, particularly for nongovernmental organizations.
Massachusetts is likely to project an image that Taiwan’s ruling Nationalist Party, or KMT, has a better relationship with China, as evidenced by the meeting, and that a change in government could be unfavorable to diplomatic relations, said the Catholic scholar.
The talks, at a luxury hotel in the neutral venue of Singapore, lasted less than an hour but were heavy with symbolism.
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Four Taiwanese fighter jets escorted Mr Ma’s plane shortly after it took off from Taipei, as is tradition of the self-governing island’s air force paying respect to the president.
