Mainland's top negotiator on Taiwan affairs to have simple funeral

The funeral of Wang Daohan, Chinese mainland's top envoy on Taiwan affairs, will be simple and open to just a number of his intimate friends and the deputies from some organizations, Wang's children told Xinhua in Shanghai Monday.

They thanked the Chinese compatriots in Taiwan, Hong Kong and Macao and overseas Chinese for their condolences to the decease of Wang, president of the Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Straits (ARATS), who passed away in Shanghai on Saturday at the age of 90.

"We're deeply moved that many personages in Taiwan, Hong Kong and Macao and overseas Chinese hope to come to Shanghai and attend our father's funeral to express their condolences," said Wang's children in a written statement.

"But my father left a will that he wished to have a simple funeral, therefore we can satisfy the wish of only some of our father's friends and the deputies from some organizations," according to the statement.

Wang and Koo Chen-fu, then chairman of the Taiwan-based Straits Exchange Foundation (SEF), held the first cross-Straits high-level and non-governmental talks since 1949 in Singapore in 1993.

They held the second talks in Shanghai and reached a four-point consensus involving cross-Straits dialogue on political issues in 1998.

The significant Wang-Koo meetings were considered milestones in cross-Straits relations by introducing rapprochement between the mainland and Taiwan.

Source: Xinhua