by Our Foreign Desk

THE head of Taiwan’s Nationalist Party reaffirmed its support for eventual unification with the mainland yesterday when he met Chinese President Xi Jinping.

Party chairman Eric Chu also affirmed Taiwan’s desire to join the proposed Chinese-led Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank during the meeting.

Relations between the mainland and Taiwan’s Nationalist Party began to warm in the 1990s, partly out of their common opposition to the island’s formal independence from China, a position advocated by the rival Democratic Progressive Party.

President Xi had offered Mr Chu equal talks to resolve their political differences, but only if Taiwan accepted that it was part of China.

“The two sides can consult with each other on an equal basis under the principle of ‘one China’ and reach a reasonable arrangement,” President Xi said.

In his role as head of China’s ruling Communist Party, the president met Mr Chu in ­Beijing’s Great Hall of the People, the first encounter between the leaders of the old political rivals in six years.

While business ties between Taiwan and China have improved to their best level in six decades since Taiwanese President Ma Ying-jeou took office in 2008, there have been no publicly acknowledged talks on the island’s political future.

President Xi said both parties “should be brave when facing lingering political differences and difficulties, pool the wisdom of compatriots of both sides and actively search for a solution.”

Mr Chu’s Nationalists are generally pro-China, while the opposition Democratic ­Progressive Party leans towards independence, something China insists it will never allow.