Taiwan's Minister of Labour, Hung Sun-han, took part on Monday in an Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) meeting in China "without setbacks", an unusual shift from the current tensions between Taipei and Beijing.
© Lusa
22/09/2026
by
Lusa
“The participation of Hung and his delegation took place smoothly and the Chinese side made the necessary arrangements in accordance with APEC’s practices and standards,” indicated the Taiwan Labour Ministry in a statement quoted by the CNA agency.
The ruler arrived Sunday night at Nanjing International Airport in eastern China to participate in the eighth Ministerial Meeting on Human Resources Development held in the same city the following day.
Photographs released by the ministry showed Hung sitting behind a sign with the designation “Chinese Taipei” (“Chinese Taipei”), under which Taiwan participates in the organization.
The visit was the first visit to China by a Taiwanese minister since the inauguration in May 2024 of the President of the island, William Lai, often described by the Beijing authorities as “independent” and “disturbing”.
Although the visits of Taiwanese politicians to China are relatively frequent – opposition leader Cheng Li-wun met last April in Beijing with Chinese President Xi Jinping – the movement of figures linked to the ruling Progressive Democratic Party (DPP) is less common.
The DPP argues that Taiwan is already ‘indeed’ an independent country under the official name of the Republic of China.
Taiwan has participated in APEC since 1991, but does not send its presidents to the summits of forum leaders due to China's opposition, which in recent years has intensified diplomatic pressure to limit the island's international participation.
The Taiwanese government denounced last year that Beijing imposed “additional conditions” on its participation in the APEC summit scheduled for November in Shenzhen, southern China, to which the American President, Donald Trump, may also visit.
It has not yet been announced who will represent Taiwan at the meeting of leaders. Last year, Taipei sent presidential advisor Lin Hsin-i and, on previous occasions, chose Morris Chang, founder and former president of TSMC, the world's leading manufacturer of advanced semiconductors.