A 30-member delegation of Taiwan's New Party, headed by Chairman Yok Mu-ming, arrived on the mainland on Wednesday afternoon for what it called an 8-day "journey of the Chinese nation" aiming to improve cross-Straits relations.

The visit closely follows those by two other Taiwan opposition parties, the Kuomintang and People First Party, in April and May.

Speaking after arriving at Guangzhou's airport, Yok said the New Party chose the 60th anniversary of China's victory in the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression to make the trip because "these memories remind us that we must be united."

The delegation is scheduled to visit places involved in the struggle for national independence and to remember those who died in Guangzhou, Nanjing, Dalian and Beijing.

These include the Huanghuagang 72 Martyrs' Tombs in Guangzhou, the Mausoleum of Dr. Sun Yat-sen and Memorial Hall of the Victims of the Nanjing Massacre in Nanjing, a wartime prison in Dalian, and the Lugou Bridge (also known as the Macro Polo Bridge) and Memorial Hall of the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression in Beijing.

In the capital the delegation is also expected to hold discussions with mainland academics at a symposium.

Meeting with Zhang Dejiang, secretary of Guangdong's Communist Party of China provincial committee, yesterday afternoon, Yok said "We want to make it clear to all Chinese in the world: only when we are united, can we realize peace across the Straits and open up a new stage in the 21st century when we feel proud and elated."

Earlier, he had said he would "tell the world" that the mainland and Taiwan both belong to one China and that "the vicious goal of a minority of politicians is doomed to fail."

(Xinhua News Agency July 7, 2005)