China’s Xi touts peace - and points to global conflicts - in rare meeting with Taiwan opposition leader | CNN

Chinese leader Xi Jinping invoked ongoing global conflicts and the need for peace during a landmark meeting with the leader of Taiwan’s opposition on Friday and reiterated Beijing’s opposition to the independence of the self-ruled island. The visit to Beijing by Cheng Li-wun, the leader of Taiwan’s Kuomintang (KMT), was the first such meeting in a decade and comes weeks before US President Donald Trump is set to visit China for talks with Xi where Taiwan is expected to be high on the agenda. “Today’s world is far from peaceful, and peace is all the more precious.” said Xi at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing. Beijing refuses to talk to the independence-leaning Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) which has governed Taiwan for the past decade. China claims the island as its own and has not ruled out using force to take it one day. In recent years it has ramped up pressure and military drills around Taiwan, raising concerns tensions could escalate into geopolitical conflict. “Compatriots on both sides of the strait are Chinese people and one family,” Xi said, adding Beijing was willing to work with political parties in Taiwan “on the common political basis of…