ROANOKE TIMES 

                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: SUNDAY, December 19, 1993                   TAG: 9312190061
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL                    PAGE: A-15   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: 
DATELINE: TAIPEI, TAIWAN                                LENGTH: Short

TAIWAN, CHINA HOLD 1ST TALKS IN TAIWAN

In another tentative step toward ending their 45-year standoff, Chinese and Taiwanese officials met on Taiwanese soil for the first time Saturday.

Previously, Taiwan had opened its borders to representatives from Beijing only for private, personal visits. Yet the two have been meeting on a semiofficial basis since April, with all but one of the encounters in China. The first was in Singapore.

Saturday's talks drew protests from Taiwan's independence movement. Taiwan went its own way in 1949 when it became the last refuge for the Nationalist Party after Communists took over mainland China.

Since then, the island off China's southeast coast has developed one of the world's fastest-growing industrial and export-oriented economies. Both countries seek reunification, but on their own terms. - Associated Press 


 by CNB