Chinese President Xi Jinping met with Eric Chu (Cheng Li-wun), chairwoman of Taiwan's Kuomintang (KMT, the main opposition Nationalist Party), at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing on 10 April, in a meeting marked by a prolonged 14-second handshake. The encounter was widely seen as a deliberate signal from Beijing that it can make gradual progress toward absorbing Taiwan through peaceful overtures rather than military force. The timing was notable: Washington was preoccupied with Middle East tensions, and Chinese warships continued to operate in the Taiwan Strait even as the diplomatic imagery unfolded.