“They don’t decide where we travel,” noted the speaker of the US House of Representatives.
The US “will not allow” China to isolate Taiwanthe president of the House of Representatives said today in Tokyo Nancy Pelosi after her visit to the island sparked outrage in Beijing.
Ms. Pelosi, who is making Japan — the last stop on her Asia tour — her first visit since 2015, traveled to Taiwan on Tuesday and Wednesday.
Beijing considers the autonomous island of 23 million people an integral part of Chinese territory, a breakaway province destined to be reunited with the mainland in the future. He reacted starting yesterday Thursday military high schools unprecedented range around Taiwan, deploying fighter jets, helicopters and ships and launching ballistic missiles, some of which passed over the island and fell, for the first time, inside the Japanese EEZ, according to the defense ministry in Tokyo.
“The Chinese proceeded with these launches possibly using our visit as a pretext,” Ms. Pelosi said during a news conference in Tokyo.
“They are trying to isolate Taiwan”he added, recalling that Beijing rejected in the spring a US appeal to allow the island’s authorities to participate in the annual assembly of the World Health Organization (WHO).
Nevertheless “They will not isolate Taiwan because we will prevent them from doing so. We’ve had high-level visits, senators went there in the spring.”it was a “cross-party” initiative, he said, insisting “we will not allow them to isolate Taiwan.”
“They don’t decide where we travel”noted the president of the House of Representatives.
Despite this, Mrs. Pelosi said that her tour of the region “it was not intended to change the status quo here in Asia, to change the status quo in Taiwan.”
Officially, since 1979, Washington has recognized only one Chinese government, the one in Beijing, although it plays the role of Taipei’s protectorate and is the largest supplier of weapons to its armed forces.
The visit, said the president of the American House, “regarded the ‘Taiwan Relations Act'” passed by the US Congress in 1979 and defining US-Taiwan relations, as well as the US/China , all the texts of the laws and agreements that define our relations”.
And even to “celebrate” Taiwan “for what it is, a great democracy with a prosperous economy, with respect for all its population.”
Referring to Sino-American relations, Mrs. Pelosi opined that if the US remained silent “on the issue of human rights in China because of (their) commercial interests”then “we would lose all moral authority” and “we wouldn’t be able to talk about human rights anywhere else in the world.”
Chinese missile launch
THE China launched missiles today who allegedly flew over her Taiwan and they first fell into Japan’s exclusive economic zone at the start of military exercises around the island in response to US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s visit to Taipei.
The Japanese foreign minister Yoshimasa Hayashi called for the “immediate cessation” of Chinese military exercises. “China’s actions this time have a serious impact on peace and stability in the region. I appeal for the immediate cessation of these military exercises“, he told reporters in Phnom Penh, where he was attending a meeting of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN).
Despite stern warnings from China, which considers Taiwan one of its provinces, Nancy Pelosi, one of the highest-ranking US officials, spent Tuesday and Wednesday on the island before starting today on a visit to Japan, the last stop of her Asia tour.
Nancy Pelosi’s initiative is seen by China as a provocation, support for Taiwan’s independence supporters and a breach of the US promise not to have formal relations with the island.
In response, the Chinese military fired a series of missiles that flew over Taiwan before falling for the first time in Japan’s exclusive economic zone (EEZ). under the guise of military exercises in six maritime areas around Taiwan – in busy commercial sea lanes – and sometimes just 20 kilometers from the island’s shores.
Japan protest
Four of the five Chinese ballistic missiles that fell into Japan’s EEZ “reportedly flew over the island of Taiwan,” Japan’s defense ministry said today.
Calling the incident “a serious problem affecting our national security and that of our citizens,” Japanese Defense Minister Nobuo Kishi clarified that “Japan has protested to China through the diplomatic channel.”
For his part, US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken stressed that Washington had communicated with Beijing “at all levels of government” in recent days appealing for calm.
“I really hope that Beijing will not provoke a crisis and will not look for a pretext to increase its aggressive military operations,” he told colleagues on the sidelines of the ASEAN summit in Phnom Penh.
Twenty-two Chinese fighter jets briefly entered Taiwan’s air defense zone today, Taiwan’s defense minister said at a press briefing on Chinese military exercises.
Air defense systems were persistently tracking Chinese aircraft, he added on his website.
The drills, which began early Thursday afternoon, included “conventional missile fire” off Taiwan’s east coast, said Xi Yi, a spokesman for the Chinese military. “All the missiles hit their target accurately,” he stressed in a statement.
Condemning “senseless actions that undermine regional peace”, Taiwan’s defense ministry confirmed that the Chinese military had fired “11 Dongfeng ballistic missiles” between 13:56 and 16:00 local time into waters north, south and east of Taiwan.
Launching projectiles
On Pingtan, a Chinese island near the exercise site, AFP journalists witnessed the launch of several missiles on Thursday afternoon that left plumes of white smoke behind.
In this part of Chinese territory, which is the closest to Taiwan, reporters also saw five military helicopters flying at low altitude near a tourist site.
The Chinese military drills are expected to end at noon on Sunday.
According to the Chinese newspaper Global Times, citing military analysts, the specific exercises are of an “unprecedented” scale.
“If Taiwanese forces come face-to-face (with the Chinese military) and fire by mistake, (the Chinese military) will respond forcefully and it will be up to the Taiwanese side to bear all the consequences,” an unnamed military source in the ranks told AFP. of the Chinese army.
For Beijing, these exercises are “a necessary and legitimate measure” after Nancy Pelosi’s visit.
“In the face of malicious provocations that so blatantly violate China’s sovereignty and territorial integrity, our countermeasures are justified,” Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying said on Thursday.
The drills are aimed at simulating a “blockade” of the island and include “attacking targets at sea, striking targets on the ground and controlling airspace,” according to the official Xinhua news agency.
Repetitive tensions
Although the possibility of an invasion of Taiwan, which has a population of 23 million, does not seem likely, concern has intensified since the 2016 election of current President Tsai Ing-wen.
Hailing from a pro-independence party, Tsai, unlike the previous government, refuses to recognize that the island and the mainland are part of “one China”.
Visits by foreign officials and parliamentarians have also increased in recent years, angering Beijing.
However, China does not want the existing situation to worsen or get out of control, experts told AFP.
“An accidental war” caused by an incident “is the last thing Xi Jinping wants” ahead of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) congress, said Titus Chen, a political science professor at National Sun Yat-Sen University. in Taiwan.
Amanda Hsiao, China analyst at the International Crisis Group, notes, however, that these drills “represent a clear escalation from the usual Chinese military activities around the island and the last crisis in the Taiwan Strait in 1995-1996 “.
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