- Beijing last night threatened Taiwan with destruction
if President Chen Shui-bian doesn't accept China is "one nation."
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- In an official statement, the mainland government warned
Taiwan leaders to make choices about the future carefully or the "Chinese
people will crush their schemes firmly and thoroughly at any cost."
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- "At present, the relations across the Taiwan Strait
are severely tested," the statement said. "To put a resolute
check on the 'Taiwan independence' activities aimed at dismembering China
... is the most pressing task before the compatriots on both sides of the
strait."
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- The statement was issued by the Taiwan Affairs Office
under the Communist Party and the State Council. It came four days before
Chen is inaugurated as president.
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- "Chen Shui-bian has left Taiwan society deeply torn
with his vicious mischaracterization of the popular will of the Taiwan
people, his unbridled instigation of hostility and animosity towards the
mainland, and his frenzied provocation to the status quo that both the
mainland and Taiwan belong to the one and same China," the harshly
worded document said.
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- China offered Taiwan a carrot as well as a stick.
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- If Chen accepts the one-China policy, Beijing held out
the hope of negotiations leading to an end to hostilities, establishment
of a mechanism to resolve cross-strait disputes, direct commercial and
transport links, closer economic co-operation and greater market access.
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- The statement added: "The Taiwan leaders have before
them two roads: one is to pull back immediately from their dangerous lurch
towards independence ... The other is to keep following their separatist
agenda to cut Taiwan from the rest of China, and in the end, meet their
own destruction by playing with fire."
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- Taiwan's Mainland Affairs Council and the Presidential
Office had no immediate response to the statement.
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- The U.S. has sent its aircraft carrier strike group led
by the USS Kitty Hawk to cruise the East Asian region ahead of Thursday's
inauguration ceremony.
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- © 2004 WorldNetDaily.com, Inc.
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- http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=38520
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