Blood is thicker than water. Except that which flows through the veins of Taiwan's Democratic Progressive Party it seems. Yet whatever ulterior motives the DPP secessionists on the island harbor by trying to de-sinicize the island, it will be almost impossible for them to dilute the blood ties between people on both sides of the Taiwan Strait as they hope.

It is true that there are differences between both sides in terms of political systems and other institutional operations. Yet what cannot and will never change is that both sides of the Strait belong to one country and Chinese people living on both sides of the Taiwan Strait are members of the same family, sharing ties of blood and a common destiny.

The recent nine-day visit by a delegation of mainland college students, including Olympic table tennis champion Ma Long and shooting champion Yang Qian, should have been a testament to the blood ties between both sides of the Strait. The warm welcome they received from various sectors in Taiwan spoke volumes about how people in Taiwan cherish the cordial relations between both sides. Yet the DPP vampires have tried to drain the blood from these exchanges.

Yet reaffirming that such blood ties will not be sucked dry, Ma Ying-jeou, former chairman of the Chinese Kuomintang party, will lead a group of Taiwan youth to the mainland provinces of Heilongjiang and Sichuan later this month to participate in a major ice-themed event and engage in other exchange activities.

This visit will be Ma's second trip to the mainland this year, following a tour starting from the end of March, during which he led a Taiwan youth delegation to Guangdong, Shaanxi and Beijing. The visit concluded with a meeting between Ma and Xi Jinping, general secretary of the Communist Party of China Central Committee.

That the mainland continues to do whatever it can to support and promote cross-Strait youth exchanges points to the fact that the Chinese mainland has not given up its efforts to seek the peaceful reunification of the motherland.

Just as Ma Ying-jeou said, the more exchanges there are between young people across the Strait, the fewer misperceptions there will be and the less chance of conflict in the future.

The mainland does not exclude the option of taking back the island by force, as there are some secessionists on the island who seek "Taiwan independence" through collusion with external powers, but what the mainland has been doing to facilitate youth exchanges across the Strait is a bid to lay a solid foundation for the peaceful settlement of the Taiwan question.

It is to be hoped that what the mainland has been doing in response to the DPP's de-sinicization attempts pays dividends in the form of increased affection and understanding between youth across the Strait. And this in turn promotes the peaceful settlement of the Taiwan question.