'Chinese leadership daydreaming': Taiwan mocks plan to build Beijing-Taipei network

Taiwanese social media users and politicians on Monday mocked a Chinese plan to construct a transportation network linking Beijing and Taipei, which many people dubbed as "science fiction" and "daydreaming" by China.

This follows the release last week of the "Guidelines on the National Comprehensive Transportation Network Plan," by Chinese State Council which includes several proposed transportation links, with one map showing a line running from China's Jingjinji Metropolitan Region (Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei) across the Taiwan Strait to Taipei, reported Taipei Times.

"This is the Chinese leadership daydreaming again of [fulfilling its] fantasy of extending China's transportation network to Taiwan. I suggest people regard it as science fiction," Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Legislator Wang Ting-yu said.

"It is China's 'united front' propaganda machine at work... [Chinese leaders] believe that by building a transportation link to Taipei, the Beijing government can claim that Taiwan falls under Chinese jurisdiction," he added.

According to the Chinese plan, highway and railway links would be completed by 2035, with the final phase of the project connecting Fuzhou in China's Fujian Province to Taipei through an undersea tunnel through the Taiwan Strait.

Wang further remarked that corruption is rife in China's transportation sector and many government officials have been arrested for siphoning money off highway and railway construction projects, additionally suggesting that Beijing should look after itself instead of the neighbouring country

"The State Council should be more ambitious by announcing a plan to build a road linking China to the moon," he added.

Meanwhile, some netizens on social media joined in to mock China's new plan.

"It is propaganda for their internal consumption, designed to deceive their own citizens. Taiwanese can already can see it is a hoax," said a netizen who called himself Johnny.

"This shows that the 'One Belt, One Road' project is China's dream to build transportation networks to Asia, Europe and Africa, to unite all these continents under Chinese motherland's rule," another social media user wrote.

"I suggest China build a trans-Pacific railway connecting Beijing to Washington in the US," another netizen surnamed Liu commented.

( With inputs from ANI )