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Washington defies Beijing by sending minister to Taiwan

2020-08-05T20:43:19.196Z


The United States will soon send its most eminent delegation to Taiwan since it stopped diplomatically recognizing the island in 1979, an announcement which angered Beijing on Wednesday without firing a shot. Read also: Taiwan in turn in the sights of Xi Jinping In the midst of an almost daily deterioration of ties between China and the United States, Beijing accused Washington of "seriously end...


The United States will soon send its most eminent delegation to Taiwan since it stopped diplomatically recognizing the island in 1979, an announcement which angered Beijing on Wednesday without firing a shot.

Read also: Taiwan in turn in the sights of Xi Jinping

In the midst of an almost daily deterioration of ties between China and the United States, Beijing accused Washington of "seriously endangering Sino-American relations as well as peace and stability in the Taiwan Strait" , which separates the two rival states. The US representation in Taiwan has confirmed that US Secretary of Health Alex Azar will head the delegation that will visit the island on a date that has not been specified. "Taiwan is a model of transparency, cooperation and collaboration with the international community , " Alex Azar said on American 24- hour news channel Fox News on Wednesday, praising Taipei's "incredible" management of the Covid epidemic. -19.

"This marks (...) the first visit of a member of the government in six years" , declared the American Institute of Taiwan, adding that no minister of such rank had visited "since 1979 " . It was that year that the United States severed diplomatic relations with Taipei, the island's capital, in order to recognize the Beijing-based Communist government as China's sole representative. They remain, however, with some ambiguity, the island's most powerful ally and its main supplier of arms. Taiwan confirmed the next visit, specifying that Mr. Azar would meet on this occasion President Tsai Ing-wen, Beijing's pet peeve who accuses him of seeking the formal independence of the island of 23 million inhabitants.

"Common values"

The visit "and another testament to the strong partnership between Taiwan and the United States which is based on our old friendship and common values , " the president said on Twitter. Despite bilateral ties, the United States has traditionally been cautious in the nature of its official contacts with Taipei. That changed with Donald Trump, who moved closer to Taiwan as relations deteriorated with Beijing on a number of issues. The island's successes against the Covid-19 and its assertion as one of the most progressive democracies in Asia have also earned it broad support on the American political spectrum. Shortly after his election, Donald Trump became the first US president to meet with a Taiwanese counterpart since 1979, when Tsai called him to congratulate him. The Trump administration has ramped up sales of sophisticated military equipment to the island, including last summer's sales of hunters. The last visit to Taiwan by a member of the US government was in 2014 by the head of the Environmental Protection Agency. The previous one dated back to 2000, when Bill Clinton's Transportation Secretary visited the island.

"Transparency model"

In their press releases, Washington and Taipei present Alex Azar's visit as linked to the pandemic, while Beijing has obtained to exclude Taiwan from the World Health Organization (WHO). Despite its geographic and commercial proximity to mainland China from where the epidemic started, Taiwan has recorded fewer than 500 cases of coronavirus and only seven deaths. “Taiwan has been a model of transparency and cooperation in health during the Covid-19 pandemic, and long before that,” said Alex Azar.

But the epidemic is by no means an exception in Beijing's eyes. "China firmly opposes official exchanges between the United States and Taiwan," Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin told reporters, adding that Beijing had protested to the administration. Trump. The People's Republic of China considers Taiwan to be one of its provinces. The island is ruled by a rival regime which took refuge there after the communists seized power on the mainland in 1949, at the end of the Chinese civil war. Taiwan is not recognized as an independent state by the UN. And Beijing threatens to use force in the event of a formal proclamation of independence in Taipei or outside intervention - notably from Washington. The visit "is justified in view of the exemplary performance of Taiwan against Covid-19 and the exclusion of Taiwan from the WHO under Chinese pressure," Bonnie Glaser, of the Center for Strategic Studies and international in Washington.

Source: lefigaro

All news articles on 2020-08-05

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