Background
There was no contact for over 50 years between Taiwan — where the Kuomintang (KMT) had retreated — and China since the Communist Party of China established the People's Republic of China in 1949, after the Chinese Civil War. However, when the Chinese Economic Reform began welcoming foreign funds in the 1980s, China sought greater contact with Taiwan. Chiang Ching-kuo refused, beginning a policy of "Three Noes". The Three Noes policy was abandoned, however, when a Taiwan flight was hijacked and Taiwan was forced to negotiate with China, beginning a series of negotiations. Merchants started investing China and people visited their relatives. Air traffic between Taiwan and China grew dramatically, but no direct flights were allowed. Passengers traveling to China had to travel via an intermediate destination such as Hong Kong or Macau, or via South Korea and Japan. The travel time usually took more than a half day, especially during the holidays such as the Spring Festival.
In the 1990s, the government of China proposed the 'three direct links' - including direct air flights between China and Taiwan - to ease the travel problem. However, Taiwanese government rejected this idea.
In 2002, Taiwan legislator John Chiang proposed that there should be special charters across the strait, and received support from the public and the aviation industry in Taiwan.
Read more about this topic: Cross-strait Charter
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