Chen Shui-bian's May 20 speech reveals essence of "Taiwan Independence"

Though without obvious words of "Taiwan Independence", Chen Shui-bian's May 20 speech revealed his attempt to split China and bring about "one country on each side", said Taiwan issue specialist Huang Jiashu on Saturday.

In his inaugural speech, Chen used the expression of "Taiwan and China" to describe the present cross-Straits relations, even though he did not clearly say "one country on each side" or "one China and one Taiwan".

"That is just playing word games," said Huang, professor with the People's University of China.

On the surface, Chen did not mention the time schedule for writing a new "constitution" in 2006 and the referendum leading to "Taiwan Independence". However, he stressed in the speech there would be a "new constitution" to prepare for "people's future referendum".

Though delicately packaged, Chen Shui-bian's speech dodged the one-China principle from the beginning to the end and was brimming with the sense of "Taiwan Independence".

Taiwan joined the World Trade Organization (WTO) as an independent tariff region of China, but in Chen's speech, Taiwan became the "144th membership state" of the WTO. Moreover, Chen Shui-bian said he would let Taiwan join the World Health Organization in next two years, which is not mentioned in the English version.

The Taiwan leader also proposed to adopt "a new frame of mind" from the European Union to address future cross-Straits issues.

Chen's speech sounded less adventurous and inflammatory on the surface, but it was more dangerous and fraudulent, Huang Jiashu noted.

Huang pointed out that the statement issued by the Taiwan Work Office under the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China and the Taiwan Affairs Office of the State Council on May 17 had clearly stated the stance of the Chinese mainland: no matter who is in power in Taiwan, he must choose between two roads -- one to admit "both the mainland and Taiwan belong to the one and same China" and stop splitting activities of "Taiwan Independence" and the other to separate Taiwan from China.

"Chen's deeds in the past four years have proved him dishonest and untrustworthy; therefore, his words are not important and what we care is which road he would take," said Huang.

Source: Xinhua