Military talks offered to Taiwan
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The Chinese mainland offered on Wednesday to open talks on military issues with Taiwan "in due course", a move that experts said could cool a potential flashpoint in the Asia-Pacific region and help warm cross-Straits ties.
"We advocate conducting contacts and exchanges on military issues, including the cross-Straits military deployment issue, in a proper way at a proper time," Yang Yi, spokesman of the Taiwan Affairs Office of the State Council, told a regular news briefing in Beijing.
He told reporters that Beijing wanted to "probe establishing a cross-Straits military security mutual trust mechanism to help stabilize the situation in the Taiwan Straits and ease military security concerns".
Yang made the offer after Taiwan leader Ma Ying-jeou on Sunday called on the mainland to remove its military deployment against the island.
In response to Yang's remarks, Taiwan "premier" Wu Den-yih told the island's legislature that the time is not yet right to discuss disarmament because the two sides need to develop more trust.
"I'm afraid the time is not ripe," Wu said, according to a report from the Taipei-based Central News Agency.
With elections approaching on the island this year and in 2012, Taiwan officials may be reluctant to rush into talks with the mainland and risk raising suspicion among voters nervous about the mainland.
Cross-Straits economic ties have improved markedly since mainland-friendly Ma came into power in 2008, with the establishment of direct transport and postal links between the two sides and opening the island to mainland tourists.
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