Shanghai Deputy Mayor Hua Yuan and his delegation have arrived at Taipei's Songshan Airport ahead of the annual Taipei-Shanghai Twin Cities Forum. Both pro-independence and pro-unification demonstrators were there to greet them.
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00:00It was a lively scene here at Taipei's Songshan Airport, where Shanghai City Vice Mayor Hua
00:05Yuan and members of his delegation arrived to join the Twin Cities Forum.
00:11Now you could say that for the members of the delegation, it was a pretty smooth rollout.
00:15They didn't take any questions as they walked through the hall, got into their cars and
00:19drove away.
00:23At the same time, there were protesters from all sides of the cross-strait issue holding
00:27demonstrations outside.
00:29There was a pro-independence group shouting slogans at the Vice Mayor as he got into his
00:33car and further down the street, there was a pro-unification group there to greet the
00:39members of the delegation.
00:40I spoke to members from both groups, and here's a little bit of what they had to say.
00:48China has always wanted to invade Taiwan, no matter softly or strongly, but it is not
00:57as what Jiang Wen-han said, that we have a very good relationship, but actually it
01:02is not.
01:03And the most ridiculous is that we are passing a wrong message to the international world.
01:11I hope that there will be no more wars on our Chinese soil.
01:16I hope that on both sides of the Taiwan Strait, we will defend China, and that our compatriots
01:23on both sides of the Taiwan Strait will be united in blood.
01:25Another notable event is during the pro-independence demonstration, a man came over and began shouting
01:30very loudly and was actually dragged away by two police officers and taken across the
01:35street.
01:36After that, he gave a short speech and it turned out he was a member of one of Taiwan's
01:40smaller pro-China parties known as the New Party.
01:43He gave his speech and left without incident, but it did cause a bit of a ruckus.
01:48One thing the events here at the airport today show is that the cross-strait issue is still
01:53very sensitive in Taiwan and brings out a lot of emotions on all sides of the political
01:58spectrum.
01:59And with this being the highest profile cross-strait exchange still standing, there's sure to be
02:03plenty more debate and political discussions over the next two days.
02:08Alex Chun, Devin Tsai, and Chris Gorin for Taiwan Plus.