TAIWAN?S HIGH court rejected yesterday a lawsuit by defeated presidential candidate Lien Chan seeking to invalidate last week?s closely fought poll, saying the election commission had yet to formally declare the winner.

However, it said that after the Central Election Commission made a formal announcement on Friday, the loser could again file, leaving the way open to Lien to challenge incumbent Chen Shui-bian?s victory by a preliminary margin of 0.2 per cent.

?The main reason is that the plaintiff is required to file suit within 15 days of the Central Election Commission?s announcement of the election result,? said court spokesman Wen Yao-yuan.

?The election commission has not yet announced the result, so the court ruled to reject the lawsuit,? he said.

Lien of the Nationalist Party, the sole opposition candidate, lost Saturday?s election by just 30,000 votes out of 13 million cast just hours after an assassination attempt created a swell of sympathy for Chen.

He has filed two lawsuits, one demanding a recount and the second urging that the poll be declared invalid because of what he said were multiple irregularities.

The court had no response yet to the call for a recount.

Chen said on Tuesday he would accept the result of a recount and urged unity on the island, which faces arch-foe China across a narrow strait, to prevent the crisis from crippling the world?s 14th largest trading economy and one of Asia?s most robust.

?I have been thinking how to unify Taiwan and heal the ethnic splits between groups,? Chen told leading scholars on Wednesday.

Mistrust and disorder

Many of those who voted for Chen are ethnic Taiwanese who share his view that the island, which has been their home for generations, is an entity independent of China.

Lien?s supporters include descendants of those who fled the Chinese mainland in 1949 after losing a civil war to the Communists.

The depth of mistrust between Chen and Lien, whom he defeated in 2000, was underscored by their failure to reach a deal on Chen?s proposal to break the logjam by revising the election law.

After hours of closed-door talks, lawmakers from the two sides could reach only tentative agreement to reopen a committee session that would determine whether Chen?s proposal on a recount would be discussed by parliament on Friday.

A day earlier, committee members had got into an undignified brawl over the motion to revise the election law to make a recount automatic if the margin between the two leading candidates was one percent or less. The revision would be retroactive.

Lien dismissed the revision as too slow and wants the president to use his powers to call an immediate recount.

Nullification of the result would force another election and analysts have said such an outcome is unlikely since Lien?s party has presented little evidence of serious irregularities.

All the uncertainty had sent Taiwan?s jittery stock market into a tailspin for two days before the benchmark index staged a modest 0.66 percent rebound on Wednesday. But traders were still cautious as the political crisis persisted.

The cabinet said that a recount could be carried out on April 3 at the earliest if lawmakers passed the revision in the next few days. With 180,000 people involved, it would be completed in a day.

This still failed to appease thousands of Lien supporters who remained massed outside the presidential palace for a fourth day.

?Today, little citizens like us are here because of our morality,? said one woman. ?If he did not cheat, then I would be at home right now mopping the floor and doing laundry.?

Trying to maintain order has become a challenge.

Police arrested a man carrying a toy gun as he tried to approach Taipei Mayor Ma Ying-jeou, a close ally of Lien. The man denied he intended to hurt Ma. Another man was surrounded and beaten after he hurled eggs at a protest organiser.

Chen has rejected his opponent?s call for an emergency decree on a recount, saying this violates the constitution.

?It?s as if you have a running nose and you demand to be sent to the emergency room,? said Ker Chien-ming, head of the legislative caucus of Chen?s Democratic Progressive Party (DPP).

Alice Hung

DIFFUSING CRISIS

Taiwan?s Chen offers to meet opposition leader

• Taiwan President Chen Shui-bian, who won re-election by a hair?s breadth, agreed on Wednesday to meet opposition candidate Lien Chan if thousands of protesters massed outside the presidential palace disperse. Chen, in his first response to Lien?s request this week for a meeting, said he hoped the encounter could take place ?without pressure and threat?. ?If Mr Lien and Mr Soong can urge the crowd they brought... to leave, A-bian is willing to meet them immediately, anywhere,? Chen said, referring to Nationalist Party leader Lien and his running mate, James Soong. ?It doesn?t have to be in the presidential office, and they don?t necessarily have to come and see me. I am also willing to pay them a visit,? he told a group of scholars and activists. Lien has asked for a face-to-face meeting with Chen to defuse the crisis, which erupted after he lost Saturday?s election by 30,000 votes out of 13 million ? the closest such vote in the island?s history ? and called for an immediate recount. Thousands of Lien?s supporters massed outside the palace for a fourth day to press their demand for a recount.