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Updated Monday, November 3, 2008 9:35 am TWN, The China Post news staff



	The Formosan sika deer, which are critically endangered and possibly already extinct in the wild, will also be given to Beijing in the upcoming animal exchange. (CNA) More Photos (2)

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Taipei Zoo poised to receive pandas

TAIPEI, Taiwan -- The two long-anticipated giant pandas, gifts of Beijing, are expected to arrive in Taipei in late November or early December, according to informed sources.

The two pandas, named “Tuan Tuan” and “Yuan Yuan,” which means unification in Chinese, will be quarantined for a period of one month after arriving in Taiwan, but will be open to visitors during the Chinese Lunar New Year in late January 2009, the sources said.

The government will officially accept the offer of the two pandas when it exchanges gifts with China during the visit of Chen Yunlin, chairman of the quasi-official Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Straits (ARATS), in Taipei, Nov. 3-7.

As reciprocal gifts for accepting the pandas, Taiwan will offer Beijing species that are endemic to Taiwan — the Formosan sika deer and the Formosan serow, or wild goat.

Taipei Mayor Hau Lung-bin will be invited to witness the cross-strait animal-exchange ceremony to be held at Taipei’s Grand Hotel.

During the ceremony, ARATS’s Chen and his Taiwan counterpart, Chairman P.K. Chiang of the Straits Exchange Foundation (SEF), will engage in a symbolic exchange of animals by giving each other relevant certificates and animal dolls.

Yeh Chieh-sheng, director of the Taipei City Zoo, said that his zoo will apply for the import of the two pandas based on the reciprocity and equality basis. If the two pandas are successfully bred in 2010, then the Taipei City Zoo is likely to welcome the birth of baby pandas in 2011, Yeh continued.

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