2010-12-15 14:46

BEIJING - A Chinese mainland spokesman Wednesday said mutual investment promotion should be included in any agreement with Taiwan on the protection of investments across the Taiwan Straits.

The two sides were aiming to reach an investment protection agreement, which was in line with "common practice" and reflected the unique situation across the Straits, Yang Yi told a regular press conference of the State Council Taiwan Affairs Office.

The agreement should include both protection and mutual promotion of investment, said Yang in response to questions on Taiwan's reluctance to discuss investment promotion.

"We hope the two sides can work hard together, take account of concerns from both sides and speed up discussions so that we can realize a good agreement as early as possible," he said.

The most important concerns of the mainland were that the agreement should benefit people on both sides and contribute to cooperation across the Straits and long-term peace in the region, he said.

No agreement on investment protection would be reached at the talks in Taipei on Dec 21, which would just continue discussions, Yang said.

"It will be too hurried to reach an agreement at the coming cross-Straits talks," said Yang. "But we will reveal the progress of the discussions after the talks."

The investment protection agreement is an important part of the follow-up negotiations to the cross-Straits Economic Cooperation Framework Agreement (ECFA), which took effect in September.

The two sides had discussed creating the mechanism of investment protection, improving the transparency of investment regulation and mutually reducing restrictions, Yang said.

"Progress has been made during the talks," he said. "But the agreement involves a lot of issues and we will need more communication on many technical details."

The talks next week will be the sixth round of talks between the mainland-based Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Straits (ARATS) and the Taiwan-based Straits Exchange Foundation (SEF).