Taiwan denies entry to Chinese actor Zhang Linghe — Taipei Times

Taiwan has denied entry to Chinese actor Zhang Linghe, who stars in the historical romance series Pursuit of Jade. The decision sparked a public dispute between Taiwan’s Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) and China’s Taiwan Affairs Office (TAO), Taipei Times reports.

Positions of Taiwan and China

China’s Taiwan Affairs Office said that the Taiwanese authorities should stop “political maneuvers and unreasonable restrictions” which, according to the agency, hinder cultural exchanges across the Taiwan Strait.

The MAC responded that Taiwan welcomes visits by Chinese entertainment industry representatives if they are not involved in Beijing’s campaign against Taiwan’s national sovereignty. The council said that Zhang Linghe had posted comments on social media that denigrated Taiwan’s sovereignty and had also spoken at the Straits Forum, a platform that the MAC called an instrument of Beijing’s united front work.

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According to the MAC, the actor also failed to provide Taiwanese officials with a sufficiently clear explanation of the purpose of his visit. The agency added that the Chinese side has no grounds to accuse Taiwan of political maneuvers. The MAC said that China organized an attack in which comedian Huang Yihao was injured, the venue for his performance was damaged, and also supported a boycott of TV host Kevin Tsai.

Beijing’s historical narrative

Separately, a national security expert warned at a government briefing that Beijing’s observance of Retrocession Day and the 160th anniversary of Sun Yat-sen’s birth is an attempt to rewrite history to justify China’s claims to Taiwan.

In the expert’s assessment, China has in recent years sought to create legal grounds for its claims through a reinterpretation of the history of World War II. Beijing had previously marked Retrocession Day no more than once every five years, but last year the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress declared the date an annual holiday. The expert also said that the PRC is trying to insert itself into historical events that took place before the communist state was founded in 1949.