An expert on Taiwan-China relations said Friday that China has been trying to monopolize say in the Taiwan issue despite the fact that the issue has become one of international concern. Director Tsai Ming-yen of the National Chung Hsing University's Graduate Institute of International Politics said at a Taipei seminar that Taiwan, China and the United States all clearly understand that bilateral relations among any two of them are deeply related to the third party, but China has been trying very hard to dominate say on the Taiwan issue. While the world witnessed the stable development of Taiwan-China- U.S. triangular relations, there are still uncertain factors that may impact the future development of relations among the three parties, Tsai said at a seminar on peace in the Asia-Pacific region, co-sponsored by the Academia Sinica's Center for Humanities and Social Sciences and the Center for Asia-Pacific Area Studies. Those factors include how the United States and China would manage their 'cooperative and competitive' relations, the military imbalance in the Taiwan Straits which favors China, and China's refusal to renounce the use of force against Taiwan. Tsai pointed out that after cross-strait relations improved and U.S.-China cooperation increased, the sensitivity of the Taiwan issue has been reducing, and is no longer a 'political bargaining chip' for either Beijing or Washington as far as U.S.-China relations are concerned. However, Tsai said although the Taiwan issue was not on the agenda of a U.S-China Strategic and Economic Dialogue in July, Chinese State Councilor Dai Bingguo stated in the meeting that ' it's the core interests of China in maintaining the integration of national territory.' Dai's remarks, according to Tsai, indicate that Beijing continues to regard the Taiwan issue as its core interest and will not yield any ground on this matter while dealing with the United States. Liu Faitao, an associate research fellow with China Institute of International Studies, said at the seminar that the United States has become less capable of utilizing the Taiwan issue as a means to prevent or deter China as it had done before, as a result of China's economic rise and the recent thaw in cross-strait relations. Tsai urged Taiwan to pay greater attention to the change in the triangular relations, especially how the U.S. would react to China's intent to monopolize decision-making in the Taiwan issue and cross-strait relations. 