US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson on Wednesday urged Chinese officials to apply greater diplomatic and economic pressure on North Korea to force it to rein in its nuclear weapons program.
Tillerson’s remarks came after he and US Secretary of Defense James Mattis met with the Chinese visitors at the US Department of State, where the former general said he saw scope for a better defense relationship.
The extent to which Beijing can influence Pyongyang is key in trying to defuse the North Korean crisis, and Tillerson’s remarks came the day after US President Donald Trump appeared to suggest Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) had come up short in efforts to lean on North Korean leder Kim Jong-un’s regime.
Photo: EPA
Calling North Korea the “top security threat” to the US, Tillerson said China has a “diplomatic responsibility to exert much greater economic and diplomatic pressure on the regime if they want to prevent further escalation.”
For their part, the Chinese envoys voiced their opposition to Washington’s deployment of the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense anti-missile defense system in South Korea and demanded its withdrawal, the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a statement.
Trump, who frequently denounced China on the campaign trail, has turned to Beijing to help pressure its ally North Korea, prompting concern among Asian partners that the US might go easy on disputes in the South China Sea, where Taiwan also has claims.
However, on Tuesday, Trump sent a tweet suggesting Xi’s efforts had not borne fruit — a message he reiterated before supporters in Iowa.
“I do like President Xi,” he told the crowd on Wednesday evening. “I wish we would have a little more help with respect to North Korea, from China. That doesn’t seem to be working.”
Tillerson said the US and Chinese officials had agreed that companies from both nations should not do business with any UN-designated North Korean entities.
Trump has made halting the North Korean nuclear threat his No. 1 foreign policy priority.
On Wednesday, the US president took the formal step of extending for another year a national emergency with respect to North Korea that was first decreed in 2008 under then-US president George W. Bush.
In a letter notifying the US Congress of the move, Trump wrote that the “existence and risk of proliferation of weapons-usable fissile material on the Korean Peninsula” together with the “provocative, destabilizing, and repressive actions” of the Pyongyang regime “continue to constitute an unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security, foreign policy, and economy of the United States.”
Last month, Beijing and Washington signed a limited deal to open new markets for each other’s exports, and a long-standing friend of the Chinese leadership, Iowa Governor Terry Branstad, was confirmed as US ambassador.
However, tensions remain — particularly over China’s building of artificial islands in the South China Sea.
“Secretary Mattis and I were clear that the US position remains unchanged,” Tillerson said.
The Chinese side defended Beijing’s “right to take measures to safeguard its territorial sovereignty” and said Washington should respect its security interests.
EXPRESSING GRATITUDE: Without its Taiwanese partners which are ‘working around the clock,’ Nvidia could not meet AI demand, CEO Jensen Huang said Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) and US-based artificial intelligence (AI) chip designer Nvidia Corp have partnered with each other on silicon photonics development, Nvidia founder and CEO Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) said. Speaking with reporters after he met with TSMC chairman C.C. Wei (魏哲家) in Taipei on Friday, Huang said his company was working with the world’s largest contract chipmaker on silicon photonics, but admitted it was unlikely for the cooperation to yield results any time soon, and both sides would need several years to achieve concrete outcomes. To have a stake in the silicon photonics supply chain, TSMC and
IDENTITY: Compared with other platforms, TikTok’s algorithm pushes a ‘disproportionately high ratio’ of pro-China content, a study has found Young Taiwanese are increasingly consuming Chinese content on TikTok, which is changing their views on identity and making them less resistant toward China, researchers and politicians were cited as saying by foreign media. Asked to suggest the best survival strategy for a small country facing a powerful neighbor, students at National Chia-Yi Girls’ Senior High School said “Taiwan must do everything to avoid provoking China into attacking it,” the Financial Times wrote on Friday. Young Taiwanese between the ages of 20 and 24 in the past were the group who most strongly espoused a Taiwanese identity, but that is no longer
A magnitude 6.4 earthquake and several aftershocks battered southern Taiwan early this morning, causing houses and roads to collapse and leaving dozens injured and 50 people isolated in their village. A total of 26 people were reported injured and sent to hospitals due to the earthquake as of late this morning, according to the latest Ministry of Health and Welfare figures. In Sising Village (西興) of Chiayi County's Dapu Township (大埔), the location of the quake's epicenter, severe damage was seen and roads entering the village were blocked, isolating about 50 villagers. Another eight people who were originally trapped inside buildings in Tainan
SHARED VALUES: The US, Taiwan and other allies hope to maintain the cross-strait ‘status quo’ to foster regional prosperity and growth, the former US vice president said Former US vice president Mike Pence yesterday vowed to continue to support US-Taiwan relations, and to defend the security and interests of both countries and the free world. At a meeting with President William Lai (賴清德) at the Presidential Office in Taipei, Pence said that the US and Taiwan enjoy strong and continued friendship based on the shared values of freedom, the rule of law and respect for human rights. Such foundations exceed limitations imposed by geography and culture, said Pence, who is visiting Taiwan for the first time. The US and Taiwan have shared interests, and Americans are increasingly concerned about China’s
RSS