A mainland passenger
jet is ready to take off from Xiamen, Fujian province for Taiwan in this
January 25, 2006 photo. The flight was part of chartered flight
arrangement during the Spring Festival.
[newsphoto] |
Aviation organizations in the Chinese mainland and Taiwan have agreed to
launch regular passenger charter flights between the island and the mainland
during major holidays of the year, it was announced on Wednesday.
General
Administration of Civil Aviation (CAAC) announced on Wednesday that the
mainland-based Cross-Straits Aviation Transport Exchange Council and the Taipei
Airlines Association have reached a consensus on the framework of chartered
flights for festivals and special cases.
The festival chartered flights
will be opened during the 14 days around the Spring Festival, and the seven days
around the other three festivals, according to the agreement. According to the
arrangements, direct chartered flights will be arranged during the Qingming
Festival (a day for remembering the deceased), the Dragon Boat festival (the
fifth day of the fifth month on the lunar calendar), the Mid-Autumn
Festival (15th day of the eighth month on the lunar calendar) and the
Spring Festival.
Each side will undertake 84 round flights, including 48 during the Spring
Festival, according to the agreement.
The destinations of the chartered
flights include Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, Xiamen on the mainland, and Taipei
and Kaohsiung in Taiwan. All Taiwan residents, businessmen and their relatives
with valid certificates can take the flights.
Six airline companies on
each side will carry out the chartered flights. Specific arrangements will
follow the operation of the Spring Festival chartered flights in 2006, the
agreement said.
The two sides have held talks on the flights over
the past year through private airline representatives. They have also reached a
"tentative consensus" on launching regular cargo charter flights but have yet to
agree on details.
A spokesman from the Taiwan Affairs Office of the State Council welcomed
the flight arrangement, and hoped direct flights will be finally agreed
upon so as to better serve people of the two sides.
Direct air links have become an
urgent issue facing the cross-Straits exchanges with the development of economic
and trade relations between the two sides, said the spokesman.
It is the
demand of millions of Taiwan compatriots who come to the mainland every year for
business, visiting relatives and travel. It's also the demand of Taiwan farmers
who want to lower transportation cost of selling their fruits and vegetables to
the mainland, the spokesman said.
When meeting with Lien Chan, then head
of the Kuomintang (KMT) party, and James CY Soong, chairman of the People First
Party (PFP), in 2005, Hu Jintao, general secretary of the Communist Party of
China Central Committee, expressed the mainland's consistent standpoint to push
forward two-way and comprehensive "three direct links" in mail, transport and
trade across the Straits, he added.
"We welcome any progress in
promoting direct, two-way and comprehensive links across the Taiwan Straits,
which is of the interests of the Chinese compatriots on both sides," Pu
Zhaozhou, director of the Cross-Straits Aviation Transport Exchange Council,
said Wednesday.
"Our sincerity to promote direct air links between the
mainland and Taiwan has never changed," Pu said.
The new agreement,
however, still cannot meet the demand on direct transportation links from the
compatriots on both sides, he added.
"We hope the Taiwan authorities can
allow the airlines on both sides to make arrangements for weekend and regular
chartered flights as early as possible to satisfy the compatriots' demand," he
urged.
The mainland
had called for regular passenger flights between the two sides of the Taiwan
Straits to faciliate travels of Taiwanese people working and studying in the
mainland.
But Taipei has banned direct transportation links with the mainland since the
sides split amid civil war in 1949, citing security concerns. Passengers
traveling to the mainland have to fly through a third point, usually Hong
Kong.
Taipei has come under tremendous pressure to launch direct air links, as an
estimated 3 million Taiwanese travel to the mainland each year for business or
sightseeing. Under pressure from the Taiwanese and after talks between the two
sides, direct chartered passenger flights were arranged during the traditional
festivals, as Spring Festival, but Taipei authorities requested such
flights to fly over Hong Kong before they could arrive in the mainland or
in the island.
Taiwan also hopes to attract mainland tourists to the
island, but the trips would not be appealing because the indirect flights
add extra time and expense.
