Professional Breakfast,
Wu Poh-hsiung,
Chairman of the Kuomintang, The Republic of China

The speech and Q & A will be in Mandarin with English interpretation.

*Doors open and buffet service starts at 08:45. The speaker's brief remarks are scheduled to begin at 09:30 and will be followed immediately by Q & A.

The Taiwan-China relationship showed signs of improvement after the long-ruling Kuomintang (KMT), or Nationalists, were back in power in May after eight years. This in turn raised concerns in Japan over whether thawing relations across the Taiwan Strait might actually cast a shadow over Taiwan-Japan relations.

To ease that concern, Japan has been receiving various senior figures from Taiwan, the latest one, KMT Chairman Wu Poh-hsiung.

Wu, 69, is considered a heavy-weight politician in Taiwan, having served as Taipei mayor, Interior Minister and Secretary General of the Presidential Office before taking up the helm of the KMT in 2007.

He is also at the center of Taiwan's overtures to China. Soon after President Ma Ying-jeou was inaugurated on May 20, Wu made a historic trip to China to hold a meeting with Chinese President Hu Jintao. This marked the first such meeting between the two political rivals' ruling parties in almost six decades.

Wu will come to the FCCJ on Dec. 10 (Wed.) and share his views on current Taiwan-China relations, and the implications for the region.

Wu Poh-hsiung