Improving relations between Taiwan, China

To be sure, that is practically the only one thing he must try the best he can to accomplish in the next four years. Is he up to it?

During the long presidential campaign, Ma did not offer any concrete plans for achieving a modus vivendi between Taipei and Beijing. He proposed to form a common market across the Taiwan Strait, which, however, was blasted by his Democratic Progressive Party rival Frank Hsieh as a proposal of unconditional surrender to China. If formed, Hsieh alleged, the common market would turn Taiwan into the Tibet of today.

Hsieh was right in claiming that any such common market is impossible without a nod of Beijing, though the common market isn’t a bad idea at all. Whatever its name, such an arrangement would prevent Taiwan from being marginalized economically in Asia and the Pacific. Taiwan needs it, but leaders in Beijing won’t start negotiation with their Taipei counterparts unless the latter accept the “one China” principle.

All Ma could say was to resume dialogue in line with what is known as the “consensus of 1992.” Under that unsigned agreement, both Taipei and Beijing acknowledge there is but one China whose connotations can be orally and individually expressed. That was the sine qua non China laid down for negotiation. It has changed. Wen Jiabao, Chinese premier, changed it to the one China principle with a different interpretation of that one China omitted, while criticizing the Dalai Lama for instigating the “riots” in Lhasa last week.

Ma condemned the Chinese suppression in Tibet and said he would consider letting Taiwan boycott the Beijing Olympics in August.

He should reconsider.

And he should do something more. We hope the president-elect would say he would go to Beijing, just like U.S. President George W. Bush. The Games are for peace. Even the Dalai Lama does not oppose, if not outright support, the Beijing Olympics.

If accepted, his trip to Beijing is the best olive branch Taiwan could extend to China. It will mark the beginning of a real dialogue across the Taiwan Strait that would set the modus vivendi in place and usher in a lasting peace in one of the world’s flashpoints.

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