Taipei: Premier Cho Jung-tai said on Saturday that Kuomintang (KMT) Chairperson Cheng Li-wun was "playing with fire" with her remark a day earlier that the Taiwan Strait should "never be a chessboard for interference by external forces."

According to Focus Taiwan, Cheng made the remark during a meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping in Beijing on Friday, as she called for Taiwan and China to forge closer ties and avoid conflict. Cho told reporters in Taoyuan that the Taiwan Strait is an international waterway open to free transit, and Cheng's remark revealed an "erroneous" strategy that unilaterally pandered to China.

Comparing Cheng's stance to "playing with fire," Cho said it would put Taiwan's future and its people's free and democratic way of life at risk. In a statement later the same day, the KMT rejected Cho's comments, saying that Taiwan's ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) was unable to handle cross-strait relations and was resorting to smearing the opposition as pro-China.

The KMT added that the DPP government, despite years in power, has only escalated confrontation with and created hostility toward Beijing. Premier Cho, who is from the DPP, also criticized Cheng for echoing Xi's remarks about facilitating the "great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation" during her meeting with Xi.

Cho warned that Cheng's comments were a "mistake," as they could have fueled China's ambition to absorb the Taiwan Strait and Taiwan. The phrase "rejuvenation of the Chinese nation" refers to the CCP's goal to turn China into a great power by 2049, the 100th anniversary of the People's Republic of China (PRC), but it also connotes making Taiwan officially part of the PRC.

China's "national reunification," which includes annexing Taiwan, is an "essential step toward national rejuvenation," according to a White Paper published by China's Taiwan Affairs Office in 2022 and other official speeches and documents. The KMT and the Chinese Communist Party "engaged in nearly 100 years of political struggle. Yet in yesterday's meeting, the Kuomintang appeared to have completely lost its confidence," Cho said.

Cho also criticized the KMT leader for proposing the establishment of a cross-strait peace framework to "institutionalize peace." He said history has proven that in the various negotiations between the KMT and the CCP -- and in the case of Tibet and Hong Kong -- "peace without strength is bound to fail."

"Such peace can instead embolden aggressors, and only peace backed by strength can serve as the foundation of national power," Cho said. In its statement, the KMT responded by stating that applying Hong Kong and Tibet to Taiwan "exposes the DPP's helplessness on cross-strait issues" and its inability to engage in dialogue with China.

"Repeatedly using Taiwan's security as a tool for political struggle is truly playing with fire, and they've already gone too far," the KMT said.