MAC chairwoman says Taiwan should not sign CEPA with China
Taiwan News, Taipei
MAC chairwoman says Taiwan should not sign CEPA with China
By Staff Writer
4 December 2008
Taiwan and China should not be signing a Closer Economic Partnership Agreement such as the one between Beijing and Hong Kong, Mainland Affairs Council chairwoman Lai Shin-yuan said yesterday.
However, P.K. Chiang, the chairman of the Straits Exchange Foundation, the semi-official body in charge of negotiations with Beijing, said the name of an agreement was not important as long as its contents benefited Taiwan.
Chiang reportedly told a Hong Kong publication that Taiwan could take the CEPA as an example, said Democratic Progressive Party lawmaker Kuan Bi-ling during a questioning session with Lai and Chiang at the Legislative Yuan yesterday.
"CEPA and the Comprehensive Economic Cooperation Agreement suggested by President Ma Ying-jeou would have a similar content, so what matters is not the name, but whether it benefits Taiwan," Chiang told Kuan.
The DPP fiercely opposes a CEPA because it would downgrade Taiwan’s status as a sovereign and independent nation, relegating the island to the same level as Hong Kong, a Special Autonomous Region of China.
Lai insisted to lawmakers she would not sign a CEPA with China, but Chiang said that international trade agreements bore a range of different names, such as Free Trade Agreement.
