Ku Chen-fu, chairman of the Strait Exchange Foundation (SEF) in Taiwan, died of renal failure in Taipei Monday morning. He was 87.

Born on Jan. 6, 1917 in Taipei, Ku, whose ancestral home was in Hui'an County, Fujian Province of southeast China, was a famous tycoon in Taiwan, as well as a veteran member of the Kuomintang party, which fled to the island province after losing the Chinese civil war between 1946 and 1949.

Ku was appointed chairman of the 1st to 4th Board of Supervisors of the SEF in 1990, 1993, 1996 and 1999. In April, 1993, Ku and Wang Daohan, president of the mainland-based Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Straits, held first high-level non-governmental talks between the two sides of the straits in Singapore. The talks were known as the Ku-Wang meeting.

From October 14 to 18, 1998, Ku visited the mainland and held second talks with Wang in Shanghai. He also met with then Chinese President Jiang Zemin and Vice Premier Qian Qichen in Beijing.

Ku was survived by his widow Yen Cho-yun. The couple had three sons and three daughters.

(Xinhua News Agency January 3, 2005)