Taiwan's opposition leader seeks to win friends in China with a high-stakes visit

TAIPEI, Taiwan — Before President Donald Trump arrives in China last month, Chinese President Xi Jinping will have another visitor: a Taiwan opposition leader, who

TAIPEI, Taiwan — A few weeks before President Donald Trump arrives in China next month, Chinese President Xi Jinping will have another visitor: Taiwan’s opposition leader.

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When Cheng Li-wun, chairperson of Taiwan’s Nationalist Party, touches down in China on Tuesday, it will mark the first time in a decade that the head of her party visits the mainland.

It will also be a defining step for Cheng, 56, who took the reins of the party — also known as the Kuomintang or KMT — in November, in a political about-face that has made her a divisive figure in Taiwan, a self-ruling democracy that rejects Beijing’s sovereignty claims.