Former US secretary of state Mike Pompeo yesterday said that he was willing to travel to Taiwan with US House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi.
“Nancy, I’ll go with you. I’m banned in China, but not freedom-loving Taiwan,” Pompeo wrote on Twitter. “See you there!”
Pompeo — who visited Taiwan for the first time in March and has urged the US to officially recognize it as a free, independent nation, and establish official diplomatic ties — made the comment amid frothy rhetoric from China and contradictory signals coming out of Washington over Pelosi’s possible visit.
Photo: AFP
The Financial Times on Monday last week first reported that Pelosi was planning to visit Taiwan next month.
Pelosi has not confirmed when, or even if, she would visit.
Should the trip be confirmed, Pelosi would be the first sitting US House speaker to visit Taiwan since 1997, when her predecessor Newt Gingrich of the Republican Party traveled to Taipei and met then-president Lee Teng-hui (李登輝) during another period of tense cross-strait relations.
File photo: AP
The Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs on Tuesday last week said that a visit to Taiwan by Pelosi would seriously undermine China’s sovereignty and territorial integrity, and the US would bear the consequences of its response.
US President Joe Biden on Wednesday last week said that he plans to speak with Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) by the end of the month. Biden appeared to cast doubt on Pelosi’s reported trip to Taiwan.
“I think that the military thinks it’s not a good idea right now, but I don’t know what the status of it is,” Biden told reporters.
The Financial Times on Saturday cited sources as saying that China has issued stark private warnings to the Biden administration, adding that the private rhetoric suggested a possible military response.
China yesterday confirmed that it had delivered sterner warnings to US officials about Pelosi’s possible visit to Taiwan.
“The Chinese side has made it clear to the US on many occasions that it is firmly opposed to Speaker Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan. We are fully prepared,” Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesman Zhao Lijian (趙立堅) told a media briefing.
“If the US goes its own way, China will certainly take firm and forceful measures to safeguard its national sovereignty and territorial integrity, and the United States should be held responsible for any serious consequences,” he said.
A number of Republican US lawmakers have urged Pelosi to proceed with the trip.
Among them were US representatives Tom Tiffany and Scott Perry.
“We strongly encourage you to reject the objections of China’s rulers and President Biden and proceed with your planned trip,” they said in a joint letter on Friday. “As the Speaker of the United States House of Representatives, you should never have to ask a foreign dictatorship or the State Department for permission to talk to America’s friends and allies.”
They also called on Pelosi to convene a floor vote to pass a resolution to end “the outdated and nonsensical” “one China” policy to normalize US-Taiwan relations.
“The world has undergone dramatic changes since the days of [former US presidents] Richard Nixon and Jimmy Carter. Taiwan has become a vibrant, multiparty democracy, while China has become more oppressive, more belligerent, and more dangerous,” the letter said.
“Yet America’s policy framework remains on autopilot, frozen in a 1970’s time warp. It is time for [the US] Congress to revisit this policy and have an open and honest debate about how best to modernize it,” it said.
GEARING UP: An invasion would be difficult and would strain China’s forces, but it has conducted large-scale training supporting an invasion scenario, the report said China increased its military pressure on Taiwan last year and took other steps in preparation for a potential invasion, an annual report published by the US Department of Defense on Wednesday showed. “Throughout 2023, Beijing continued to erode longstanding norms in and around Taiwan by employing a range of pressure tactics against Taiwan,” the report said, which is titled “Military and Security Developments Involving the People’s Republic of China (PRC) 2024.” The Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) “is preparing for a contingency to unify Taiwan with the PRC by force, if perceived as necessary by Beijing, while simultaneously deterring, delaying or denying
PEACEFUL RESOLUTION: A statement issued following a meeting between Australia and Britain reiterated support for Taiwan and opposition to change in the Taiwan Strait Canada should support the peaceful resolution of Taiwan’s destiny according to the will of Taiwanese, Canadian lawmakers said in a resolution marking the second anniversary of that nation’s Indo-Pacific strategy on Monday. The Canadian House of Commons committee on Canada-Chinese relations made the comment as part of 34 recommendations for the new edition of the strategy, adding that Ottawa should back Taiwan’s meaningful participation in international organizations. Canada’s Indo-Pacific Strategy, first published in October 2022, emphasized that the region’s security, trade, human rights, democracy and environmental protection would play a crucial role in shaping Canada’s future. The strategy called for Canada to deepen
TECH CONFERENCE: Input from industry and academic experts can contribute to future policymaking across government agencies, President William Lai said Multifunctional service robots could be the next new area in which Taiwan could play a significant role, given its strengths in chip manufacturing and software design, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) chairman and chief executive C.C. Wei (魏哲家) said yesterday. “In the past two months, our customers shared a lot of their future plans with me. Artificial intelligence [AI] and AI applications were the most talked about subjects in our conversation,” Wei said in a speech at the National Science and Technology Conference in Taipei. TSMC, the world’s biggest contract chipmaker, counts Nvidia Corp, Advanced Micro Devices Inc, Apple Inc and
LEAP FORWARD: The new tanks are ‘decades more advanced than’ the army’s current fleet and would enable it to compete with China’s tanks, a source said A shipment of 38 US-made M1A2T Abrams tanks — part of a military procurement package from the US — arrived at the Port of Taipei early yesterday. The vehicles are the first batch of 108 tanks and other items that then-US president Donald Trump announced for Taiwan in 2019. The Ministry of National Defense at the time allocated NT$40.5 billion (US$1.25 billion) for the purchase. To accommodate the arrival of the tanks, the port suspended the use of all terminals and storage area machinery from 6pm last night until 7am this morning. The tanks are expected to be deployed at the army’s training
RSS