Chen Yunlin, president of the Beijing-based quasi-official Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Straits (ARATS), is expected to visit Taiwan in late October or early November.

Chen said in Nanjing Sept. 22 that he would visit Taiwan in a month to discuss with the Taipei-based Straits Exchange Foundation (SEF) issues such as the launch of cross-Taiwan Strait cargo charter flights, the establishment of direct shipping links, and the expansion of direct passenger charter flights that are currently operated on weekends and holidays only.

Discounting media reports saying that the time and venue for Chen's meeting with SEF Chairman P.K. Chiang in Taipei might be altered amid mounting concerns in Taiwan over toxic chemical-tainted food products imported from China, Liu said the exact timing of the Chen-Chiang meeting has never been determined and that officials from the two intermediary bodies have continued to exchange views on the matter.

The media speculation that the Chen-Chiang meeting will be postponed is "untrue," Liu said.

Chen held a landmark meeting in June with Chiang in Beijing and signed agreements on the launch of the weekend cross-strait charter flights and the admission of more Chinese tourists to Taiwan.

The SEF and ARATS are intermediary bodies set up by Taiwan and China respectively to handle cross-strait affairs in the absence of official ties.

Meanwhile, Cheng Wen-tsang, director of the opposition Democratic Progressive Party's Department of Culture and Communications, said that his party will not welcome Chen to visit Taiwan before China apologizes and compensates Taiwanese individuals whose health has been undermined and companies who have sustained uncountable losses because of the imports of dairy products and related foodstuffs from China that were adulterated by the toxic chemical melamine.

Ruling Kuomintang spokeswoman Chen Shu-jung noted that based on concerns about Taiwanese people's interests and well-being, the SEF and the ARATS must meet and conduct detailed talks on the aftermath of the tainted dairy products incident.

"Only by meeting and talking can the two intermediary bodies perhaps work out resolutions to the incident and secure results that are beneficial for people on both sides," she said.