Chinese Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi (楊潔箎) has warned the US that despite improved cross-strait relations, Beijing will never accept Taiwan’s independence.
“I want to stress that no matter how the situation across the Taiwan Strait may evolve, we will never waver in our commitment to the ‘one China’ principle,” he said.
Speaking at a closed-door luncheon at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) immediately before he went to the White House to meet US President Barack Obama, Yang said: “We will never compromise our opposition to Taiwan independence, two Chinas, or one-China, one-Taiwan.”
Sources later said that he repeated his statement during private talks at the White House and that he said almost exactly the same thing earlier in the week to US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
But in its official reaction to Yang’s four-day visit, Washington omitted all mention of Taiwan.
Yang told CSIS: “We hope that the US side will honor its commitments prudently and properly handle Taiwan-related issues and take concrete actions to support the peaceful development of cross-strait relations.”
“China will continue efforts to bring about new progress in the peaceful development of cross-strait relations,” he said.
The conservative think tank later released a video of the speech.
The Obama administration and the administration of former US president George W. Bush before it have gone out of its way to praise and promote improved relations between Taipei and Beijing under President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九).
But analysts have continually warned that major policies have not changed and that China remains ready to take over Taiwan, by force if necessary.
Yang did not refer to Taiwan in any of his public statements in Washington but said that the primary point of his visit was to prepare for a meeting between Obama and Chinese President Hu Jintao (胡錦濤) that will take place early next month in London on the sidelines of the G20 summit.
The two leaders are certain to discuss Taiwan at that time and Hu is expected to urge Obama to end arms sales to Taipei.
Following the Oval Office meeting the White House issued a statement saying that the president and foreign minister had discussed “the overall state of the US-China bilateral relationship, emphasizing the desire of both sides to strengthen cooperation and build a positive and constructive US-China relationship.”
Yang said that relations with the US were “at a new starting point and have important opportunities to develop.”
But speaking from Beijing, Hu said that China did not want to be seen as bowing to others.
He said that China would “vigorously advance modernization of national defense and the military” and would “staunchly defend national sovereignty, security and territorial integrity and provide a powerful support and assurance for protecting national development interests and broad social stability.”
Also See: Obama calls for measures to stop China Sea clashes
A decision to describe a Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs statement on Singapore’s Taiwan policy as “erroneous” was made because the city-state has its own “one China policy” and has not followed Beijing’s “one China principle,” Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Tien Chung-kwang (田中光) said yesterday. It has been a longstanding practice for the People’s Republic of China (PRC) to speak on other countries’ behalf concerning Taiwan, Tien said. The latest example was a statement issued by the PRC after a meeting between Singaporean Prime Minister Lawrence Wong (黃循財) and Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) on the sidelines of the APEC summit
The Taipei Zoo on Saturday said it would pursue legal action against a man who was filmed climbing over a railing to tease and feed spotted hyenas in their enclosure earlier that day. In videos uploaded to social media on Saturday, a man can be seen climbing over a protective railing and approaching a ledge above the zoo’s spotted hyena enclosure, before dropping unidentified objects down to two of the animals. The Taipei Zoo in a statement said the man’s actions were “extremely inappropriate and even illegal.” In addition to monitoring the hyenas’ health, the zoo would collect evidence provided by the public
A road safety advocacy group yesterday called for reforms to the driver licensing and retraining system after a pedestrian was killed and 15 other people were injured in a two-bus collision in Taipei. “Taiwan’s driver’s licenses are among the easiest to obtain in the world, and there is no mandatory retraining system for drivers,” Taiwan Vision Zero Alliance, a group pushing to reduce pedestrian fatalities, said in a news release. Under the regulations, people who have held a standard car driver’s license for two years and have completed a driver training course are eligible to take a test
Taiwan’s passport ranked 34th in the world, with access to 141 visa-free destinations, according to the latest update to the Henley Passport Index released today. The index put together by Henley & Partners ranks 199 passports globally based on the number of destinations holders can access without a visa out of 227, and is updated monthly. The 141 visa-free destinations for Taiwanese passport holders are a slight decrease from last year, when holders had access to 145 destinations. Botswana and Columbia are among the countries that have recently ended visa-free status for Taiwanese after “bowing to pressure from the Chinese government,” the Ministry