TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — Former Taiwan President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) will visit China next month.
The former Kuomintang (KMT) president’s trip was announced by his Ma Ying-jeou Foundation on Monday (March 25), which said that Ma will lead a delegation of students to visit Chinese cultural and historical sites, as well as enterprises, per CNA. Ma was Taiwan’s president between 2008 and 2016 and has been a strong advocate of closer cross-strait ties post-presidency.
The visit will be Ma’s second trip to the People’s Republic, following a controversial first trip in March 2023, in which he made comments such as “We are all Chinese,” referring to people on both sides of the Taiwan Strait.
Ma’s trip will take him to Guangdong, Shaanxi, and Beijing between April 1-11, Ma Ying-jeou Foundation Director Hsiao Hsu-tsen (蕭旭岑) said. The group will also visit Sun Yat-sen University and Peking University to encourage cross-strait exchange, he added.
Hsiao did not say if Ma would meet senior figures in the Chinese government when in Beijing. He also said that Ma is deeply concerned about cross-strait tensions, and if there are opportunities to discuss this, they will be discussed as appropriate.
The trip has also been reported to the office of the current Taiwan president, Hsiao said. He added that Ma’s previous trip was “extremely positive,” and that such visits prove the efficacy of cross-strait youth exchanges.
Hsiao said he believes that if people begin cross-strait exchanges at an early age, they will develop deeper ties in the future. The greater the contact and the deeper the friendship between both sides, the less chance there will be of conflict, he said.
