Cross-Strait relations talks had broken down. Chen Shui-bian was elected President of the ROC in 2000. Politically, Chen is strongly pro-Taiwan independence. Chen's repudiation of the 1992 Consensus combined with the PRC's insistence that the ROC agree to the "one China" principle for negotiations to occur prevented improvement in cross-strait relations. Hu Jintao became President of the PRC in 2003, though he was ruling "de facto" paramount leader as General Secretary of the Communist Party of China since late 2002. Chen called for talks without any preconditions, repudiating the 1992 consensus while Hu continued to insist that talks can only proceed under
Hu Jintao but it was clear that Hu's actions in Lhasa earned him unprecedented attention in the upper echelons of party power, including by "paramount leader" Deng Xiaoping. When tanks rolled into Tiananmen Square, Hu was one of the first regional leaders to publicly declare his support for the central authorities. Hu experienced high-altitude sickness in June 1990, and returned to Beijing, but remained in his position for another two years, during which Hu achieved little. But his departure to Beijing was seen as a merely means to return to the centerfold of Chinese politics, which led to some doubts as to