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Opinion
The strategic logic of Xi’s historic meeting with Taiwan’s Cheng Li-wun
The meeting and Beijing’s 10-point policy package send an unmistakable message to the Taiwanese public
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Jianlu Bi is a senior fellow at the Foreign Policy in Focus think tank at the Institute for Policy Studies in Washington, DC, and a research fellow at the Charhar Institute in Beijing.
On April 12, Beijing’s Taiwan Affairs Office unveiled a 10-point policy package aimed at turning political dialogue into practical action. From restoring regular direct flights to sharing water, electricity and gas supplies with the frontline islands of Quemoy, also known as Kinmen, and Matsu, the measures represent a tangible peace dividend.
Kuomintang chairwoman Cheng Li-wun’s visit to Beijing, where Communist Party chief Xi Jinping held a historic meeting with her, signifies a profound shift in cross-strait relations. This breakthrough addresses three critical dimensions: the containment of secessionist volatility, the restoration of a fractured national identity and the practical transformation of political consensus into livelihood security.
The first and most immediate significance of Cheng’s visit lies in maintaining peace and stability amid global geopolitical fragmentation. We live in an era defined by a polycrisis – from the protracted conflict in Ukraine to the volatility in the Middle East. Against this backdrop, the Taiwan Strait has often been characterised by Western media as “the most dangerous place on Earth”, a narrative that risks turning the island into the front line of a proxy war.
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