Against the backdrop of escalating tensions between Washington and Beijing, China has threatened to take firm countermeasures over a planned meeting between Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen and US House of Representatives Speaker Kevin McCarthy. Speaking at a press conference on Wednesday, spokeswoman for the Taiwan Affairs Office of the State Council of China Zhu Fenglian denounced Tsai's visit to her diplomatic allies in Central America, and demanded that no US officials meet with her.
"We firmly oppose this and will take firm countermeasures. The United States should refrain from arranging visits with Tsai Ing-wen and even contacting US officials," she said.
And the President of Taiwan, who is heading from today to Guatemala and Belize on a trip during which she will stop in the American lands, said: "We will not give in to any external pressure."
In turn, the United States warned Beijing against any "exaggerated reaction" to a stopover by Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen in New York on her way to Central America and in Los Angeles on her way back. "There is absolutely no reason for China to use this as an excuse to overreact or to put more pressure on Taiwan," said a senior US official. He stressed that "this is a private and unofficial visit" that respects "a long-standing practice."
He refused to confirm the possibility of a meeting in California between Tsai Ing-wen and the Republican leader in the House of Representatives, Kevin McCarthy, who hails from this state in the American West.
Chinese diplomatic pressure on Taiwan has recently mounted, as Beijing tries to reduce Taipei's diplomatic allies while sending fighter jets to fly over the island almost daily.
Honduras established diplomatic relations with China this month, leaving Taiwan with only 13 countries to recognize as a sovereign state.
Beijing regards Taiwan as Chinese territory, but has not been able to unite it with the rest of its territory. And in the name of the "one China" principle, it believes that no country should establish official relations with Beijing and Taipei at the same time, and it had expressed its opposition to any official exchanges between the island and the United States.
In August 2022, a visit to Taiwan that she made on the personal initiative of Nancy Pelosi, who was then Speaker of the US House of Representatives, angered Beijing, which in response to this move organized large-scale military maneuvers around Taiwan.
For its part, Washington considers that the Taiwanese president's stay on American soil does not in any way violate the US policy on "one China" and that it is just a "transit", even if she meets with personalities.
Okaz (Beijing, Washington) @OKAZ_ONLINE