ARATS: 1992 Consensus touchstone for Taiwan authority's goodwill

The Chinese mainland-based Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Straits (ARATS) said Wednesday that the 1992 Consensus is the touchstone for testing Taiwan's current administration's goodwill.

"Carrying out negotiations and talks across the Taiwan Strait and promoting peaceful development of cross-Strait relations have been our consistent positions," said an ARATS statement.

The mainland has reiterated that the ARATS' negotiation and contact mechanism with its counterpart in Taiwan, the Straits Exchange Foundation (SEF), will only be resumed if the latter is authorized to confirm adherence to the 1992 Consensus, which sets out the one-China principle, it said.

The ARATS released the statement in response to remarks made by SEF chairman Tien Hung-mao on Wednesday, who expressed the hope that he could meet ARATS president Chen Deming in Kinmen.

In the statement, the ARATS said that the Taiwan authority and SEF should know clearly what has led to the current impasse of cross-Strait relations and the suspension of the consultation mechanism between the ARATS and the SEF.

"If the fundamental problem of recognizing the 1992 Consensus or not is not solved, more words would be meaningless for resolving this impasse," the ARATS said.