Washington called for calm on Monday after a visit criticized by Beijing by Taiwanese Vice-President William Lai to the United States, who pledged on Sunday to “resist the annexation” of his archipelago by China.
According to Taiwanese authorities, William Lai, the ruling party’s candidate for the 2024 presidential election, is simply “transiting” through American soil before traveling to Paraguay to attend the inauguration of President-elect Santiago Peña.
But this trip has angered China, which considers Taiwan as one of its provinces and opposes any official contact between Taiwan and Western countries. Such contacts would legitimize the Taiwanese authorities and undermine Chinese claims of sovereignty over the island.
“There is no reason to turn this stopover into something that leads to an escalation,” a spokesman for American diplomacy, Vedant Patel, told reporters on Monday.
During a lunch in New York on Sunday, Mr. Lai, with assumed independence positions, reaffirmed that Taiwan should “defend the values of democracy and freedom”, during a speech broadcast by the Taiwanese channel TTV News.
« Your maintendrai […] our commitment to resist annexation or encroachment on our sovereignty,” he said.
“At this critical moment, we promise again here and now that no matter how great the authoritarian threat to Taiwan, we will never be afraid and we will never back down,” Lai told an audience. including representatives from the American Institute in Taiwan which, de facto, serves as the US Embassy on the island.
China had indicated earlier that it was closely following the visit of the “troublemaker” and had pledged to take “firm and vigorous measures to safeguard its sovereignty and territorial integrity”.
Beijing’s Taiwan Affairs Office also accused him on Sunday of “continuing to stubbornly defend the idea of Taiwanese independence in order to win votes” and of “going to the United States to betray Taiwan for its own selfish self-interest”.
William Lai, a Harvard-educated doctor turned politician and self-described “pragmatic separatist,” is Beijing’s pet peeve.
He received the nomination from the Democratic Progressive Party to run for president in 2024 and succeed President Tsai Ing-wen, whose second term will end.
Beijing-Taipei relations soured in 2016 with the arrival of Tsai Ing-wen as president, with Beijing intensifying its political and military pressure in recent years.
In April, while President Tsai was meeting US Speaker of the House of Representatives Kevin McCarthy, China held three days of military exercises simulating a blockade of Taiwan.
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2023-08-14 20:52:02
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