The Kuomintang (KMT) Party of China Chairman Lien Chan said in Shanghai Tuesday that Taiwan's best chance to achieve another "economic miracle" lies in the mainland.

"Taiwan achieved an economic miracle in the past decades and is now sprinting toward another economic miracle," Lien told mainland media before ending his historic eight-day mainland tour.

"The mainland is a chance Taiwan cannot afford to miss, no matter who is in control," he said. "We should, proceeding from the people's interest, not repeat the old way of confrontation and conflicts, but work for reconciliation and dialogue for the promotion of stability and peace across the Taiwan Straits."

The starting point for the improvement of cross-Straits relations lies in "mutual benefits and common prosperity in the overall environment of peace and stability," he said.

Lien said the mainland has made outstanding achievements in economic growth, attracting foreign investment and foreign trade. "Through cooperation (with the mainland), Taiwan will achieve greater economic successes," he said.

Statistics show indirect trade volume between the mainland and Taiwan totaled more than US$400 billion, and Taiwan has obtained an accumulated trade surplus of US$270 billions. In 2004 alone, the trade volume across the Straits reached more than US$78 billion.

Lien said that the KMT's mainland policy has been clear since the 1980s. It stresses mutual benefits, common prosperity and win-win situation for both sides across the Straits in the overall environment of peace, he said.

"Major breakthroughs were attained under the policy" when the KMT was in power, Lien said. "If the trend had continued in the past decade, the cross-Straits situation could not have deteriorated to its present stage."

On the new channels just opened between the KMT and the CPC during his talks with CPC leader Hu Jintao, Lien said that they could also serve as a platform for business people across the Straits to establish closer contacts.

Lien said that the KMT's most pressing task will be pushing for direct flights of non-stop chartered planes for both passengers and cargo on a regular basis between the two sides of the Taiwan Straits.

Direct flights can save 16 percent on the cost for cargo and 20 percent for passengers, Lien said. Without a non-stop flight, Lien Chan himself has to spend four more hours to fly from Shanghai to Taipei, because of a stopover in Hong Kong.

Direct and non-stop charter flights across the Taiwan Straits were launched in January during the Chinese lunar new year, the first in 56 years in a move widely hailed by people across the Straits.

(Xinhua News Agency May 4, 2005)