GENEVA, May 21 (Xinhua) -- The Chinese delegation to the 70th World Health Assembly (WHA) on Sunday reiterated that the one-China principle is the prerequisite for the participation of China's Taiwan in the World Health Organization (WHO)'s annual conference.
During a press conference held one day ahead of the WHA opening, it also refuted the existence of an "epidemic prevention gap" claimed by Taiwan.
In answering Taiwan-related questions, Li Bin, head of the Chinese delegation and minister of national health and family planning commission, said that it is the Taiwan authorities led now by the local Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) that has set the barrier to Taiwan's WHA attendance. She reaffirmed the cross-Straits "1992 consensus" centered on the one-China principle as the prerequisite for Taiwan's participation.
The DPP "refused to recognize that the two sides of the Taiwan Straits belong to one China. By so doing, it undermined the political basis of the cross-Straits relations, and brought the cross-Straits contact and communication mechanism to a standstill," Li said.
As a result, she noted, the political basis of Taiwan's participation in the annual conference of the global health body has ceased to exist.
According to her, from 2009 to 2016, the central government of China made special arrangements for Taiwan to attend the WHA as an observer in the name of "Chinese Taipei" in accordance with the "1992 consensus" reached between Chinese mainland and Taiwan.
However, since it won the local election in Taiwan last year, the DPP's stand has made it "impossible to carry out any cross-Straits consultations for the special arrangements anymore," said Li.
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