China’s Xi tells Taiwan opposition leader unification an ‘inevitability’

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China’s Xi Jinping has told a visiting Taiwanese opposition leader that unification with the mainland is a “historical inevitability” and issued a stern warning against any moves towards “independence”, in the first such meeting in a decade.

The Chinese president informed Cheng Li-wun, the chair of Taiwan’s opposition Kuomintang party, that Beijing also wanted greater co-operation with all political parties. Beijing claims sovereignty over Taiwan and has threatened military action if it resists in the long term.

“The current global landscape is undergoing rapid changes,” said Xi, who was flanked by members of his elite seven-person Politburo Standing Committee.

“But no matter what the international situation is . . . the great tide of cross-strait compatriots drawing closer and coming together will not change. This is a historical inevitability.”

Xi added: “‘Taiwan independence’ is the chief culprit destroying peace in the Taiwan Strait; we absolutely will not tolerate it or allow it.”

In her response, Cheng said they would “jointly launch the rejuvenation project of Chinese civilisation”.

“Although cross-strait peoples live under different systems, we will respect each other and move towards each other,” she said.

The visit by Cheng, who has described it as a “historic journey for peace”, comes as Beijing has increased military exercises around Taiwan following the election of President Lai Ching-te from the ruling Democratic Progressive Party.

Unlike the DPP, Cheng’s KMT has long supported closer ties with China. While exchanges between its leadership and Chinese officials are not rare, no sitting KMT leader has met Xi since 2016.

Cheng’s trip comes little more than a month before US President Donald Trump is due to visit Beijing in mid-May, when analysts speculate Xi will pressure him to change the American posture supporting Taiwan and cut back on arms sales to Taipei.

“Today’s meeting between the leaders of both parties is to maintain the peace and tranquillity of our common home,” Xi said.

He added that on the basis of “opposing Taiwan independence”, they “would work together with all political parties, groups, and people from all walks of life in Taiwan . . . to firmly grasp the future of cross-strait relations in the hands of Chinese people ourselves”.

During her six-day visit, Cheng also travelled to Shanghai and Nanjing, where at the Mausoleum of Sun Yat-sen, China’s revolutionary hero, she called on both sides of the strait to avoid armed conflict.

“China’s calamities have never come solely from external imperialist forces, but also much from internal contradictions and differences resulting in mutual destruction,” Cheng said.

In Nanjing, she also emphasised that all parties in Taipei should “uphold the 1992 Consensus and oppose Taiwan independence”. The consensus refers to an agreement between semi-official envoys from Beijing and Taipei in 1992 that both sides of the Taiwan Strait belong to “One China”, without making clear under which government.

Lev Nachman, a political scientist at National Taiwan University, said Cheng’s comments were typical of her brand of KMT politics, which leaned more closely towards the rhetoric of the mainland. “She has a line about not wanting to be a chess piece for outside forces [such as the US], which I’m sure America will have questions for her about but which will be another line that I’m sure Xi Jinping is very happy to hear,” Nachman said.

But he said her stance was by no means universal within the KMT, with other prominent leaders much less vocal about opposing Taiwanese independence.