Politics

Arrival of tour group signals thawing of relations

• Publication Date：11/18/2009
• Source： United Daily News

A 30-member medical tourism group from mainland China arrived in Kaohsiung Nov. 17, in a sign that relations between the southern port city and the mainland are returning to normal.

Kaohsiung City may have angered the mainland because its mayor Chen Chu received the Dalai Lama during his visit to Taiwan in early September, and because a film festival hosted by the city showed a documentary on the life of Uighur leader Rebiya Kadeer, regarded by the mainland as a "separatist" who has instigated violence in the Xinjiang region.

There has been speculation that tourist groups from the mainland, with encouragement from the mainland Chinese government, retaliated by boycotting Kaohsiung during their visits to Taiwan.

Members of the medical group visiting Kaohsiung yesterday characterized their visit as an "icebreaking trip."

"Having come to sunny Kaohsiung from Beijing with its cool, frigid air, we are appreciative of the warmth of this place," said Yang Guorong, the leader of the tour group and vice director of the Xiangyun Medical Equipment Group.

Yang said that if it became easier to travel to Kaohsiung, medical groups from the mainland seeking plastic surgery in Taiwan would arrive "in droves."

"Plastic surgery clinics will have an incredible business," he said.

In July of this year the Kaohsiung Aesthetic Medical Tourism Promotion Association and the Boxue Chengxin Medical Group signed a Cross-Strait Medical Tourism Agreement, which stipulated that medical tour groups from the mainland would "arrive in Taiwan by the south, and leave Taiwan by the south," meaning they would not arrive or leave the nation through the Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport in northern Taiwan.

Yang said during a press conference that in the future plastic surgery medical groups from the mainland would abide by this agreement.

The 30-member group includes medical personnel from the city of Beijing and the provinces of Heilongjiang, Hebei, Anhui and Hunan.

Tsao Su-ben, chairman of the board of KAMTPA, said that Taiwan’s medical skills and facilities are far superior to those of the mainland.

Tsao suggested that in the future the government should promote medical tourism in three areas: treatment of illnesses, plastic surgery and physical checkups.

"Let Taiwanese businesses go west to the mainland, and let mainlanders seeking medical care come east to Taiwan," Tsao said. (HZW)