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Cary Huang

In joining hands yesterday, the mainland and Taiwanese leaders sought to lay down a bridge that future generations can cross - but will their descendants be willing?
Analysts say the summit between President Xi Jinping and his Taiwanese counterpart Ma Ying-jeou is indeed a game-changer and has opened an avenue for dialogue that the island's next president will find difficult to ignore. But the talks are unlikely to sway the Taiwanese public to side with Ma's Kuomintang party when they head to the polls in a little over two months.
"We can't predict who will be president next year, but what I can do is to build the bridge in my term of office so that no matter who takes office ,he or she will be able to walk on the bridge and cross the river quickly," Ma told a news conference on Thursday.
"With the new bridge, future leaders can walk across the river easier and that is what the meeting means for future relations," said Taiwanese affairs expert Xu Xue of Xiamen University's Institute of Taiwan Studies. He said the summit heralded the start of regular top-level talks in the future regardless of who led on either side of the Taiwan Strait.
Allen Carlson, an associate professor at Cornell University's government department, compared the meeting to US president Richard Nixon's ice-breaking trip to China in 1972, or Barack Obama's recent effort to open relations with Cuba, saying it had opened a new chapter in cross-strait relations.
Steve Tsang, a professor at the University of Nottingham's School of Contemporary Chinese Studies, agreed that it was a landmark event but said it was not expected to change the basic drivers behind relations. "Ma and Xi think they are building a bridge, one over which Xi's successors will be only too happy to rush", but Ma's successors would find it "highly hazardous" and "prefer not to cross", he said.
Ma had demonstrably failed to persuade the Taiwanese people that his administration had governed well, Tsang said. "It is not that the Taiwanese do not want to improve relations with the mainland - they do - but they just do not accept doing so on Beijing's terms."
The ruling Kuomintang is widely expected to lose the presidency to the pro-independence Democratic Progressive Party in January and is struggling to retain its majority in the legislature.

Lin Chong-pin, a former vice-chairman of Taiwan's Mainland Affairs Council, said the summit would nevertheless become a focus of debate in the upcoming election.
Hongyi Lai, a professor of contemporary Chinese studies at the University of Nottingham, said both leaders had taken advantage of an opportunity to cement ties between their respective parties before Ma's final term ends.
Lai said Xi also wanted throw a spotlight on the DPP, to challenge it to produce a policy that would enable a similar summit in the future. But whether Ma's successor would - or could - follow remained to be seen.
Jingdong Yuan, an associate professor at the University of Sydney's Centre for International Security Studies, said the summit would give Taiwan a sense of equal status with the mainland without demanding preconditions, such as the start of political negotiations.
"It is also important in the sense that Beijing is willing to take the step of conferring equal status to Taiwan, to Ma at least, not knowing - or knowing - there were no substantive immediate gains," Yuan said.
The meeting had sent a message that the status quo, stability and peace should continue for the benefit of both sides, he said. Pursuing anything opposite could run the risk of setting ties back several decades.
The summit would affect regional security, Xu said. "It might kick-start mainland-Taiwan cooperation over their shared territorial disputes with Japan in the East China Sea and those with several East Asian nations in the South China Sea," he said.
Carlson said the meeting would have an impact on relations with the United States.
"There is a great deal at stake in this meeting for Beijing, Taipei and Washington, as such a get-together will have a profound impact not only on cross-strait relations and Taiwanese politics, but also the US-China relationship," Carlson said.
 


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Xi Jinping and Ma Ying-jeou summit

With summit, leaders lay bridge but will future generations walk across?

Demonstrators protest in Taipei on Saturday against the historic meeting in Singapore between the top leaders of the mainland and Taiwan. Photo: Kyodo

Expected next leader of Taiwan won't be boxed in by summit tactic, analysts say 

Taiwanese opposition leader and presidential candidate Tsai Ing-wen is silhouetted against a banner as she speaks during a news conference inside the Democratic Progressive Party headquarters in Taipei last month. Photo: EPA

Eric Chu chairman of Taiwan's ruling Kuomintang is trailing behind the DPP's candidate, Tsai Ing-wen, in the presidential election race. Photo: AFP

'We are brothers': Xi hails closer ties with Taiwan as closed-door talks with Ma wrap up at historic Singapore summit

Chinese President Xi Jinping (right) shakes hands with his Taiwan counterpart Ma Ying-jeou before the start of the first cross-Taiwan Strait summit since a civil war divided the two sides in 1949. Photo: Kyodo

Chinese President Xi Jinping (right) and his Taiwanese counterpart Ma Ying-jeou shake hands at 3pm on Saturday in Singapore. Photo: AFP 

Media crowd the ballroom of the hotel about 45 minutes before the leaders are due to meet. Photo: Liu Zhen

President Xi Jinping (left) and Taiwan President Ma Ying-jeou will meet in Singapore on Saturday. Photos: AP

Journalists wait outside the entrance of the Shangri La Hotel in Singapore on Friday. Photo: Zhen Liu

Hundred of journalists wait for the leaders in the lobby of Singapore’s Shangri-La Hotel at lunchtime. Photo: SCMP Pictures

Security at the Shangri-La Hotel in Singapore is increased in the lead-up to the afternoon meeting. Photo: SCMP Pictures

A bustling media crowd awaits the arrival of the two leaders at the hotel. Photo: SCMP Pictures

A picture of the conference room where the closed-door talks will take place. Porcelain cups and water bottles have been placed on the table. Photo: Weibo

A clearer picture of the table. 

The photo shows Xi making the first move in the heavily symbolic handshake. Expect postmortems from pundits to offer competing views of the significance of this later. Photo:  Weibo

Xi (left) and Ma wave as they enter the conference room at the Shangri-La Hotel for their 45-minute closed-door meeting on Saturday. Photo: Reuters

Activists protest against the meeting outside the Ministry of Economic Affairs in Taipei. Photo: Reuters

Ma (third from left) at his press conference. Photo: SCMP Pictures

Xi's nameplate is on the left and Ma's on the right. Photo: SCMP Pictures

The banquet table. Photo: SCMP Pictures

Taiwan says China has 1,500 missiles aimed at the island. Photo: Reuters

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Talks between two sides were game-changer but Taiwanese public won't be swayed, analysts say


With summit, leaders lay bridge but will future generations walk across?

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}Talks between two sides were game-changer but Taiwanese public won't be swayed, analysts say

Talks between two sides were game-changer but Taiwanese public won't be swayed, analysts say