China has said it will promote cross-strait flights, allow in Taiwanese TV dramas and facilitate sales of agricultural goods, after a rare meeting between Xi Jinping and the leader of Taiwan’s largest opposition party.
China’s Xinhua news agency said on Sunday that – as part of a 10-point plan for closer ties – Beijing would push for the resumption of more flights across the Taiwan Strait and take steps to facilitate agriculture and fishery imports.
Cheng Li-wun, head of Taiwan’s opposition Kuomintang (KMT), met the Chinese president on Friday during the first visit to China by a KMT leader for a decade. Cheng billed the trip as a “historic journey for peace”.
Beijing claims sovereignty over Taiwan and has threatened military action if it resists in the long term. China has become increasingly assertive under the Taiwanese presidency of Lai Ching-te of the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP). The DPP, which won its third presidential election in a row in 2024, opposes giving up sovereignty claims.
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The opposition KMT has long pushed for closer ties with China, though Cheng’s meeting with Xi last week – at which he told her unification was a “historical inevitability” – was the first of its kind since 2016.
[ China can never accept Taiwan independence, Xi tells Taiwanese opposition leader ]
Tourism from mainland China to Taiwan has been limited since the Covid-19 pandemic and, according to Xinhua, China will now “promote the full resumption of normalised direct cross-strait air passenger flights”. It also said China would allow the import of “healthy” television dramas from Taiwan and facilitate food imports.
William Yang, senior analyst at Crisis Group, said: “Beijing may try to use these measures to reinforce the impression that cross-strait peace and stability is possible. It will be viewed with scepticism by some Taiwanese people as they view these measures as an attempt to exacerbate Taiwan’s domestic division.”
The 10-point plan also pledged to explore a “regular communication mechanism” between the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and the KMT, as well as youth exchanges between the two parties.
In a statement published on its website, the Taiwanese government’s Mainland Affairs Council hit out at the 10-point plan, describing its measures as “political transactions” between the KMT and CCP and accusing Beijing of trying to create divisions in Taiwan.
“All cross-strait affairs involving public authority must be negotiated by both governments on an equal and dignified basis to be effective,” the council said.
In his meeting with Cheng, Xi warned against any move towards independence, which he described as “the chief culprit destroying peace in the Taiwan Strait”.
The meeting came in advance of Xi’s planned summit with US president Donald Trump in mid-May, an encounter seen as a crucial test of United States policy towards Taiwan. Beijing hopes Washington will shift to a policy that “opposes” independence.
“Beijing’s goal is to influence Trump’s thinking vis-a-vis US arms sales to Taiwan,” Yang said.
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2026
