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TAIPEI: Exiled Uighur leader Rebiya Kadeer, whom Beijing brands a separatist, plans to visit Taiwan in December following an invitation by groups advocating Taiwanese independence, a report said Thursday.
"I hope to visit Taiwan and meet with Taiwanese people. This is very simple and has nothing to do with politics," Kadeer said in footage aired by Taiwanese cable news channel TVBS.
"I have not applied for a visa yet but I hope the Taiwanese authorities will issue me a visa," she said, according to a Mandarin translation of her remarks, which she made in her native Uighur language.
She was speaking after meeting Freddy Lin, head of the organisation Guts United Taiwan and the lead vocalist of Taiwanese black metal band "Chthonic," in Washington.
The visit is tentatively scheduled for December, according to the group.
If Taiwan's government grants Kadeer a visa, it is likely to infuriate Beijing, which says she is a "criminal" who masterminded ethnic violence in her home region of Xinjiang in northwest China in July.
Beijing is already angered by the screening this week in Taiwan's second-largest city Kaohsiung of a biopic about Kadeer, "The 10 Conditions of Love".
"China should not use the screening of the documentary as an excuse to pressure the Taiwanese authorities and affect Taiwan's economy," Kadeer said.
Kadeer, who has lived in exile in the Washington area since being freed from a Chinese prison in 2005, denies orchestrating the July violence. About 200 people died when Uighurs and Han Chinese clashed.
The Kadeer film and a recent visit by exiled Tibetan leader the Dalai Lama to Taiwan have strained cross-strait ties, which have otherwise improved markedly since President Ma Ying-jeou came to power here in 2008.
- AFP/yb
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