Students from seven leading mainland Chinese universities, including two Olympic champions, will visit Taiwan later this month at the invitation of the island’s former leader Ma Ying-jeou.
According to Ma Ying-jeou Foundation director Hsiao Hsu-tsen, the 40-strong delegation of students and faculty members will arrive in Taiwan on November 27 for a nine-day visit.
The second such trip since July last year comes at a time of soaring tensions across the Taiwan Strait, with people-to-people exchanges at historic lows.
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The students from Peking University, Tsinghua University, Fudan University, Sun Yat-sen University, Zhejiang University, Fujian Normal University and Beijing Sport University will meet their peers from six Taiwanese universities, according to the island’s media.
The delegation will include table tennis legend Ma Long, a six-time Olympic champion who will represent Beijing Sport University, and shooter Yang Qian, a Tokyo Olympics double gold medallist who studies at Tsinghua University.
“In the face of unprecedented tension in cross-strait relations and the need for people-to-people exchanges, the visit of students from these prestigious mainland universities to interact with university students in Taiwan will help to ease the cross-strait atmosphere and amplify the message of peace,” Hsiao told reporters in Taipei.
A similar visit organised by the foundation last year had yielded positive outcomes, Hsiao said, adding that fostering more youth exchanges “is crucial for the development of cross-strait relations”.
In July last year, Ma invited a group of mainland Chinese students for a nine-day visit. It was the first major mainland academic group to visit the island in three years.
The 31 students and six faculty members represented Peking, Tsinghua, Wuhan, Hunan and Fudan universities. They met peers at the National Chengchi University, Chinese Culture University and National Taiwan University in Taipei, as well as National Dong Hwa University in Hualien county of eastern Taiwan.
Ding Ning, another mainland table tennis great and three-time Olympic gold medallist, was among the Peking University representatives in that delegation.
According to Taiwan’s government-funded Central News Agency, the six universities that this year’s delegation will interact with are National Taiwan University, National Tsing Hua University, National Chengchi University, National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University, Chinese Culture University and Chang Gung University. The delegation will also visit a girl’s high school in Taipei.
There will also be sightseeing trips, including to Sun Moon Lake in central Taiwan. The foundation will also arrange baseball activities to introduce the students to Taiwan’s baseball culture, Hsiao said.
Ma set up the foundation named after himself in 2018, to serve as a platform for public policy discussions on issues including cross-strait relations, youth, culture and diplomacy.
Cross-strait ties were at their warmest ever when Ma, as head of the Beijing-friendly Kuomintang, led Taiwan from 2008 to 2016. He is still viewed as an influential figure in and remains a senior KMT member.
He has visited the mainland twice in the last two years, including a trip in April when he met President Xi Jinping, their first meeting on the mainland.
Hsiao noted that Ma had extended invitations to mainland university students to visit Taiwan during both his trips, according to CNA.
In March 2023, Ma led a delegation of about 30 students and several former aides for a 12-day private trip across five mainland cities. And in April this year, he took along 20 students for an 11-day trip that he called a “journey of peace”.
Cross-strait ties began to sour under Ma’s successor Tsai Ing-wen of the independence-leaning Democratic Progressive Party and have been strained further under current leader William Lai Ching-te.
Lai, also of the DPP, took office in May and has repeatedly stated that Taiwan and the mainland “are not subordinate to each other”.
Beijing sees Taiwan as part of China to be reunited by force if necessary. Most countries, including its main international backer the United States, do not recognise the self-governed island as an independent state. However, Washington is opposed to any attempt to take Taiwan by force and is committed to arming it for defence.
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