Chinese president Xi Jinping opens Communist congress with epic three-hour speech, insisting he will 'never allow' Taiwan independence

Chinese president Xi Jinping is served tea during his lengthy address
REUTERS
Eleanor Rose18 October 2017

China's president Xi Jinping has kicked off his party's conference with a three-and-a-half hour speech, insisting Taiwan would not be made independent.

"We will never allow anyone, any organisation, or any political party, at any time or in any form, to separate any part of Chinese territory from China," Mr Xi told more than 2,000 delegates at the opening of the week-long Communist Party Congress.

The comment drew the longest applause of the epic speech.

"We have the resolve, the confidence and the ability to defeat separatist attempts for Taiwan independence in any form," he told the audience, including some 300 from the People's Liberation Army.

Taiwan is one of China's hot-button topics. China considers proudly democratic Taiwan to be a wayward province and has never renounced the possibility of using force to bring the island under control.

Former Chinese President Jiang Zemin, left, stifles a yawn beside Chinese Premier Li Keqiang at the Congress
EPA

Mr Xi has set great store on trying to resolve differences, holding a landmark meeting with then-President Ma Ying-jeou in Singapore in 2015.

But relations nosedived after Tsai Ing-wen of the pro-independence Democratic Progressive Party won presidential elections last year, with Beijing fearing she wants to push for Taiwan's formal independence, a red line for China.

Beijing has suspended a regular dialogue mechanism with Taipei established under Taiwan's previous, China-friendly, government and there has been a dramatic fall in the number of Chinese tourists visiting Taiwan under Ms Tsai's administration.

Tsai says she wants peace with China but will protect Taiwan's freedom and democracy

In Taipei, the cabinet's Mainland Affairs Council said it was "absolutely" the right of Taiwan's 23 million people to decide their future.

The perpetuation of Taiwan's democratic system was a core value of Taiwan's, the council said in reaction to Xi's speech. Tsai and her government had been restrained and not provocative towards China, but had staunchly defended Taiwan's security and dignity.

Katie Stallard, Asia correspondent for Sky News 

Letter from Beijing

By Katie Stallard

You can tell the Communist Party congress is underway because the internet slows down.  

The VPN (virtual private network) services many of us use to get around China’s ‘Great Firewall’ of online censorship repeatedly fail to connect.

And the propaganda is set to max.

In the street outside my apartment block in Beijing, huge red banners pledge to “Unswervingly Uphold the Party’s Leadership”, while security guards with red armbands keep watch from what feels like every corner.

Wherever you look, there are reminders that this a country under Communist Party control.

At this congress, we are witnessing an exhibition of Xi Jinping’s control over the Party.

Since Mao Zedong’s death in 1976, there has been progress towards the principle of collective leadership - to ensure that power could never again be concentrated in the hands of one man.

Now we seem to be heading in the opposite direction.

Xi is expected to use this five-yearly meeting to consolidate his position as the country’s most powerful leader in decades, promoting his allies, and very possibly enshrining “Xi Jinping Thought” in the party constitution - an honour only previously awarded to Chairman Mao.

If he follows the example of his predecessor, this would be the halfway point in his tenure, but there are growing doubts that he plans to stand down at the end of his second term in 2022.

Instead, he seems to be laying the groundwork for a prolonged period in power, as he sets out his vision for what he calls the “China Dream”.

Xi’s message is not dissimilar to Donald Trump’s.  As he explains it, he inherited a mess: a country whose global standing was diminished, an economy in trouble, and a party mired in the swamp of corruption, but now he is making China great again.

Expect to hear about the extraordinary progress made so far, as he builds his case to be seen as the country’s third great leader.

If Mao united the country, declaring the Chinese people had “stood up”, and Deng set them on the path to getting rich, now Xi is making them strong.

This vision of strength includes a powerful military, which he is pictured presiding over in combat fatigues, as the head of a country that is now reclaiming its rightful place in the world.

There is a darker side to life in Xi’s China dream.  

Human rights groups say he is overseeing the most severe crackdown on civil society since 1989, as sources of dissent, both real and imagined, are silenced and jailed.  Lest we forget in the ensuing pageantry, a Nobel laureate died in custody here this year.  His widow is still missing.

But the party doesn’t want to talk about that.

* Katie Stallard is the Asia Correspondent for Sky News.

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