Taiwan is sending a cabinet minister to China for the first time under the current government, a small thaw that Beijing is already framing on its own terms.

• Labor Minister Hung Sun-han will attend an APEC human resources meeting in Nanjing in late September.
• He is the first minister-level official from the Lai government to travel to China.
• Beijing's Taiwan Affairs Office said it will handle "the Taiwan region's" participation under the "one China principle" and APEC's memorandum of understanding.
• Asked twice whether it could guarantee his safety or would meet him on the sidelines, Beijing gave no direct answer and repeated the same line.
• Taiwan's foreign ministry says more than 300 people have already travelled to China for APEC meetings since December without incident.

Outlook: The trip is likely to go ahead, but the wording fight over Taiwan's status will resurface ahead of the November APEC leaders' summit in China.