The US has escalated a mounting row on multiple fronts with China, refusing Beijing’s demand to cancel US President Barack Obama’s meeting this week with the Dalai Lama.
The deepening public spat over Tibet, a row over US arms sales to Taiwan, China’s dispute with Google and trade and currency disagreements, come at a key diplomatic moment, as Obama seeks Chinese help to toughen sanctions on Iran.
The White House announced on Thursday that Obama would hold his long-awaited meeting with the Dalai Lama at the White House this week, drawing an angry reaction from China and a demand for the invitation to be rescinded.
But Obama’s spokesman Robert Gibbs signaled the White House would defy China’s warning that the encounter would damage already strained Sino-US relations.
“I do not know if their specific reaction was to cancel it,” Gibbs said. “If that was their specific reaction, the meeting will take place as planned next Thursday.”
Obama avoided the Dalai Lama when he was in Washington last year, in an apparent bid to set relations with Beijing off on a good foot in the first year of a presidency which included several meetings with Chinese President Hu Jintao (胡錦濤).
Obama, however, warned Chinese leaders on an inaugural visit to Beijing in November that he intended to meet the exiled Tibetan spiritual leader.
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Ma Zhaoxu (馬朝旭) said earlier that Beijing firmly opposed “the Dalai Lama visiting the US and US leaders having contact with him.”
“China urges the US ... to immediately call off the wrong decision of arranging for President Obama to meet with the Dalai Lama ... to avoid any more damage to Sino-US relations,” Ma said.
Obama’s meeting with the Dalai Lama will take place in the White House Map Room and not, in an apparent effort to mollify China, in the Oval Office, where US presidents normally meet VIPs and visiting government chiefs.
The International Campaign for Tibet said on Friday it welcomed the meeting.
“We believe that President Obama understands what is at stake for the Tibetan people and has a role to play as the leader of a nation founded on universal principles of freedom and justice,” said Mary Beth Markey, the campaign’s vice president for international advocacy.
‘TAIWAN-FRIENDLY’: The last time the Web site fact sheet removed the lines on the US not supporting Taiwanese independence was during the Biden administration in 2022 The US Department of State has removed a statement on its Web site that it does not support Taiwanese independence, among changes that the Taiwanese government praised yesterday as supporting Taiwan. The Taiwan-US relations fact sheet, produced by the department’s Bureau of East Asian and Pacific Affairs, previously stated that the US opposes “any unilateral changes to the status quo from either side; we do not support Taiwan independence; and we expect cross-strait differences to be resolved by peaceful means.” In the updated version published on Thursday, the line stating that the US does not support Taiwanese independence had been removed. The updated
‘CORRECT IDENTIFICATION’: Beginning in May, Taiwanese married to Japanese can register their home country as Taiwan in their spouse’s family record, ‘Nikkei Asia’ said The government yesterday thanked Japan for revising rules that would allow Taiwanese nationals married to Japanese citizens to list their home country as “Taiwan” in the official family record database. At present, Taiwanese have to select “China.” Minister of Foreign Affairs Lin Chia-lung (林佳龍) said the new rule, set to be implemented in May, would now “correctly” identify Taiwanese in Japan and help protect their rights, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a statement. The statement was released after Nikkei Asia reported the new policy earlier yesterday. The name and nationality of a non-Japanese person marrying a Japanese national is added to the
AT RISK: The council reiterated that people should seriously consider the necessity of visiting China, after Beijing passed 22 guidelines to punish ‘die-hard’ separatists The Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) has since Jan. 1 last year received 65 petitions regarding Taiwanese who were interrogated or detained in China, MAC Minister Chiu Chui-cheng (邱垂正) said yesterday. Fifty-two either went missing or had their personal freedoms restricted, with some put in criminal detention, while 13 were interrogated and temporarily detained, he said in a radio interview. On June 21 last year, China announced 22 guidelines to punish “die-hard Taiwanese independence separatists,” allowing Chinese courts to try people in absentia. The guidelines are uncivilized and inhumane, allowing Beijing to seize assets and issue the death penalty, with no regard for potential
‘UNITED FRONT’ FRONTS: Barring contact with Huaqiao and Jinan universities is needed to stop China targeting Taiwanese students, the education minister said Taiwan has blacklisted two Chinese universities from conducting academic exchange programs in the nation after reports that the institutes are arms of Beijing’s United Front Work Department, Minister of Education Cheng Ying-yao (鄭英耀) said in an exclusive interview with the Chinese-language Liberty Times (the Taipei Times’ sister paper) published yesterday. China’s Huaqiao University in Xiamen and Quanzhou, as well as Jinan University in Guangzhou, which have 600 and 1,500 Taiwanese on their rolls respectively, are under direct control of the Chinese government’s political warfare branch, Cheng said, citing reports by national security officials. A comprehensive ban on Taiwanese institutions collaborating or
RSS