Taiwan prepares for wave of Chinese tourists

TAIPEI, July 2 Kyodo - For nearly three decades, Taipei's Songshan Airport, in the city's center, has served mostly local travelers. But welders and workers on scaffolding are rushing to ready the airport for a flood of Chinese tourists later this month
amid a shift in relations between old rivals Taiwan and China.

Upgrading Songshan Airport is but a small part of Taiwan's preparation for that shift.

All across the island, other airports, hotels and travel agencies are preparing
for Chinese travelers as the island throws open its doors to its juggernaut
neighbor and Cold War-era foe.

''We are indeed ready,'' says Oliver Yu, vice minister of Taiwan's Ministry of
Transportation and Communications, referring to direct flights and tourism
links with China.

Starting July 18, up to 3,000 Chinese tourists will be allowed to visit the
island daily, arriving direct weekend charter flights across the Taiwan Strait.

Preliminary flights, operated by airlines on both sides of the strait, will
begin Friday, reversing a general ban on cross-strait charter flights except on
holidays.

The tourism plan, for its part, will end a ban on Chinese tourists traveling
directly to the island from the mainland.

The emerging links mark a new era in cross-strait relations since Taiwanese
President Ma Ying-jeou took office May 20 with vows to bury the hatchet with
China.

But whether the benefits of closer links with Beijing will trump drawbacks,
especially amid concerns the links may be premature, is a question triggering
fierce debate.

''There are concerns that the Ma administration is moving too fast and too far
in its management of relations with Beijing,'' says Tsai Ing-wen, chairwoman of
the opposition Democratic Progressive Party.

Indeed, less than a month after inauguration, Ma's government inked two pacts
with Beijing after just one day of formal talks in the Chinese capital.

Ma, critics allege, plunged headlong into the agreements on opening up the
island to what Tsai says are ''too many Chinese'' and direct flights whose
schedules remain vague or tend to shift.

What is certain, according to Yu, is that Chinese and Taiwanese airlines will
operate 36 round-trip flights from Friday to Monday between eight destinations
on Taiwan and five mainland cities, including Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou.

Highlighting security concerns are the roundabout routes of some of the
flights, which must go through Hong Kong airspace.

Before, nearly all commercial aircraft traversing the strait were required to
land in Hong Kong or Macao.

The only difference now, critics argue, is that aircraft need not land in those
cities, which lie far to the southwest of most key mainland destinations.

Flying through Hong Kong's airspace thus requires a major detour for many
passengers crossing the strait.

Behind the circuitous routes are fears that truly direct flights would allow
China to evade radar by hiding fighter jets under passenger planes or otherwise
stage a surprise attack.

Beijing targets Taipei with more than 1,000 ballistic missiles and is prepared
for an invasion of the island.

China and Taiwan split amid civil war in 1949, with the former claiming the
latter as part of its territory and vowing to unify the self-ruled island with
the mainland, by force if necessary.

Despite political friction, Taiwan's and China's economies have become
increasingly entangled in recent decades.
For Ma, embracing China with the pacts is a means to ''maximize the
opportunities'' Beijing represents while ''minimizing the risks it poses'' to
Taipei.

''China is a threat, but it is also an opportunity,'' he says.
Liang Kuo-yuan, president of Polaris Research Institute, a local think tank
specializing in economic issues, agrees.

''The contributions from direct passenger flights and tourism to our gross
domestic product will be minimal, but more business opportunities will
emerge,'' Liang says.

Although Chinese tourism is expected to contribute merely 0.22 percent to
Taiwan's gross domestic product, the flow of people across borders ''will
strengthen people-to-people contact and stabilize cross-strait ties,'' he says.

''There will be indirect economic benefits.''
But even Liang questions the wisdom of opening up to Chinese tourists airports
such as in the eastern city Hualien that either double as military airbases or
lie adjacent to sensitive military facilities.

Ma, in a bid to spread the economic benefits of Chinese tourism, has opened all
of the island's airports to the visitors.
Further worrying some critics are concerns that Chinese tourists will ditch
their tour groups to become illegal aliens.

Tsai, for her part, draws a direct correlation between a rise in Chinese
tourists and more illegal immigration.
''For every Chinese tourist that comes here,'' she warns, ''there will be a
social cost.''

Anticipating that concern, the Cabinet has increased the budget, personnel and
computer systems of the National Immigration Agency, whose Deputy Director
General Steve Wu is a picture of confidence.

Rises in illegal immigrants from China are unlikely given the agency's
screening of the incoming mainland tourists and their privileged backgrounds,
Wu says.

Those with the resources to pass the screening process are unlikely to go on
the run in Taiwan, which has become a less attractive destination for Chinese
illegal immigrants in recent years, he says. ''We can't guarantee that they
won't overstay their visas, but such a trend is highly improbable.''

For those improbable cases, some 200 new agency officers, hired and trained in
part for the tourism links, will help track down and repatriate illegals.

''From now until the end of this year,'' Wu says, referring to the initial
phase of welcoming Chinese tourists, ''nothing will happen.''==Kyodo