Taiwan’s representative to APEC James Soong met with Chinese President Xi Jinping and discussed cross-strait trade and economic exchanges

Taiwan News
Date: 2016/11/21
By Central News Agency

Taiwan’s representative to the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) leaders’ summit, James Soong (宋楚瑜), has met with Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平), to whom he expressed hope for continued trade and economic exchanges between the two sides of the Taiwan Strait, an adviser on Taiwan’s APEC delegation said Saturday.

The meeting occurred without pre-arrangement, Lee Hung-chun (李鴻鈞) told the press. He said Soong and Xi interacted with each other in “a natural and friendly atmosphere” before they participated in dialogue between APEC economic leaders and the APEC Business Advisory Council (ABAC) earlier in the day.

The content of the conversation between Soong and Xi was mainly greetings until Soong brought up his hope for the Chinese authorities to “keep unchanged the direction of cross-strait trade and economic exchanges” and “particularly of care for Taiwanese small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs),” Lee said.

He noted that this was mutually accepted and that the two agreed upon its publication.    [FULL  STORY]