Taiwan's upcoming elections will be a "heart-pounding, soul-stirring battle" for the island's future, Beijing-friendly candidate Han Kuo-yu said Sunday in his first speech since becoming the opposition party's presidential candidate.
Han described January's vote as a choice between "peace or crisis" with China in a speech to a packed stadium at the Kuomintang (KMT) party's national congress.
Taiwan has been a de facto sovereign nation since the end of a civil war in 1949 but China still views the island as its territory and has vowed to seize it, by force if necessary.
Han is looking to unseat President Tsai Ing-wen of the Beijing-sceptic Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) in a contest that will be dominated by relations with China.
"This won't be a polite gentleman's race, it will be a heart-pounding, soul-stirring battle for the survival of the Republic of China (ROC) and
"The people will make a sacred choice for the fate of our country in the next four years. We will choose whether to defend the ROC or destroy the ROC... we will choose cross-strait peace or Taiwan Strait crisis."