Direct Flights a Go - or No?
The ball appears to now be in Taiwan's court as Mainland China is reported to have agreed to conducting direct charter flights between Taiwan and the mainland during the upcoming lunar new year holidays.
A delegation of Taiwanese airline officials visiting Beijing to negotiate the flights announced that they and their mainland counterparts have agreed to terms under which direct cross-strait flights can be carried out. All that remains now, they said, is for the Taipei government to give its approval to the agreement.
The government in Taipei has banned all direct flights between Taiwan and the Chinese mainland since Chiang Kai-shek's Nationalist forces retreated to Taiwan in 1947. Special charter flights were conducted by Taiwanese airlines during the 2003 Chinese New Year holiday period but failed to get off the ground last year because Taiwan refused to allow mainland Chinese airlines to operate some of the flights. If the flights do go ahead this year, it will mark the first time for a mainland Chinese carrier to offer scheduled service to Taiwan.
Airline officials in Taiwan say that the special charter flights are necessary to relieve pressure on regularly scheduled service since as many as a half million Taiwanese living and working on the mainland are expected to return to Taiwan to celebrate the Chinese New Year.
A delegation of Taiwanese airline officials visiting Beijing to negotiate the flights announced that they and their mainland counterparts have agreed to terms under which direct cross-strait flights can be carried out. All that remains now, they said, is for the Taipei government to give its approval to the agreement.
The government in Taipei has banned all direct flights between Taiwan and the Chinese mainland since Chiang Kai-shek's Nationalist forces retreated to Taiwan in 1947. Special charter flights were conducted by Taiwanese airlines during the 2003 Chinese New Year holiday period but failed to get off the ground last year because Taiwan refused to allow mainland Chinese airlines to operate some of the flights. If the flights do go ahead this year, it will mark the first time for a mainland Chinese carrier to offer scheduled service to Taiwan.
Airline officials in Taiwan say that the special charter flights are necessary to relieve pressure on regularly scheduled service since as many as a half million Taiwanese living and working on the mainland are expected to return to Taiwan to celebrate the Chinese New Year.
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