XIAMEN - Top political advisor Yu Zhengsheng on Saturday called for more exchanges and mutual support between grassroots people in the Chinese mainland and Taiwan.

Yu, chairman of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, made the remarks when meeting with personages from both the mainland and Taiwan at the 5th Straits Forum.

Yu hailed the forum as an increasingly influential event as well as a significant platform for promoting exchanges between grassroots people from both sides.

This year's forum is scheduled from June 15 to 21 in the coastal city of Xiamen in southeast China's Fujian province.

Yu urged further consolidating the political, economic, cultural and social foundations for the peaceful development of cross-Strait relations and bringing more benefits to grassroots people from both sides.

Stressing that compatriots from the mainland and Taiwan belong to one family, Yu called for strengthened exchange as well as mutual support and care despite the estrangement between the two sides born out of historical issues.

Lin Fong-cheng, vice chairman of the Kuomintang Party, and other forum participants from Taiwan called for Chinese people from both sides to unite wisdom, emotion and willpower to build a bright future for the Chinese nation.

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