BEIJING, April 30 -- Li Weiyi, the State Council Taiwan Affairs Office spokesman, said in Beijing Wednesday the mainland welcomes the visit of Wu Poh-hsiung, chairman of the Kuomintang (KMT) or the Nationalist Party.

"We know from media that Chairman Wu is planning to visit the mainland in early June and welcome him," Li said at a routine press briefing.

On the role of both the Communist Party of China (CPC) and the KMT in influencing the cross-Strait dialogue, Li said the shared aspiration and cooperation will be significant to the peaceful development of the cross-Strait relations, which was expounded by Hu Jintao, general secretary of the CPC Central Committee, and Lien Chan, honorary chairman of the KMT, at their Tuesday meeting.

The resumption of the dialogue mechanism between the Taiwan-based Straits Exchange Foundation (SEF) and the mainland-based Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Strait (ARATS), on the basis of the "1992 Consensus," is quite important to addressing practical issues of mutual concern and promoting the peaceful development of the cross-Strait relationship.