Former minister of foreign affairs Tien Hung-mao, who is well-versed in cross-strait affairs, has been appointed as head of the Straits Exchange Foundation (SEF). The Democratic Progressive Party “deep-green” fundamentalists welcome the decision despite Tien’s light green political color spectrum. A Chinese scholar, however, described the pick as a “big mistake” given a shaky relationship between Taiwan and China.
Tien served as the first Foreign Minister under former Taiwanese President Chen Shui-bian, who was the first President representing the independence-leaning Democratic Progressive Party in 2000.
On Thursday evening, Presidential Office spokesperson Alex Huang announced the appointment of Tien. The SEF is a semi-official organization under the supervision of the Mainland Affairs Council (MAC).
According to MAC, Tien has long been dedicated to China studies, actively facilitating exchanges and visits between both sides of the Strait and is believed to bring meaningful benefits to cross-strait relations and iron out wrinkles that would otherwise jeopardizes the interactions in many aspects.
Tien has also been a dedicated promoter of Taiwan’s participation in the international community and played a role in the democratization of Taiwan, according to the Presidential Office.
After the announcement, Tien was quoted as saying that he is willing to take this challenge for the country and will keep a positive attitude to deal with all sorts of difficult situations facing between SEF and its Chinese counterpart Association for Relations across the Taiwan Straits (ARATS).
According to the Central News Agency, Tien has been described as a pro-green, but a former MAC official said Tien is a pragmatic “light-green.” The official added that after discharging the duty as a Foreign Minister, Tien has joined a think tank and has ever accompanied Taiwan’s Evergreen founder Chang Yung-fa to meet Jiang Zemin, the former General Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China.
Also, Tien was said to visit the mainland China many times since 2008 as a chief consultant of the Chinese National Federation of Industries, developing a wide meaningful network in mainland China.
Wu Yongping, deputy dean of the Institute of Taiwan Studies at Beijing’s Tsinghua University, however, sees the pick as a “big mistake,” saying that it is a bad choice to appoint a pro-green to head the office in charge of cross-strait affairs given the lack of the 1992 Consensus and a shaky cross-strait relationship at the moment.
New Straits Exchange Foundation chief appointed amid doubts
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