Taiwan president says wants talks with China, but not 'one country, two systems'

Taiwan wants dialogue with China but cannot accept its proposal for "one country, two systems", President Tsai Ing-wen said on Wednesday after being inagurated for her second and final term in office.

"Here, I want to reiterate the words 'peace, parity, democracy, and dialogue'. We will not accept the Beijing authorities' use of 'one country, two systems' to downgrade Taiwan and undermine the cross-strait status quo. We stand fast by this principle," she said in a speech.

China uses this system, which is supposed to guarantee a high degree of autonomy, to run the former British colony of Hong Kong, which returned to Chinese rule in 1997. It has offered it to Chinese-claimed Taiwan too, though all major Taiwanese parties have rejected it.