Asked about a plan to visit Taiwan by the patron saint of American deputies, which arouses the fury of Beijing as much as the embarrassment of the American government, Joe Biden replied that according to the army, it was “not a good idea“.
Asked about a potential visit to the island of Nancy Pelosi, leader of the House of Representatives and as such one of the highest figures in the state, Joe Biden replied Wednesday evening: “The army thinks it’s not a good idea, but I don’t know where we are.»
“China strongly opposes”
A number of American delegations recently visited Taiwan, an island supported by the United States but which China claims as part of its territory. But Nancy Pelosi would be the highest institutional American personality to go there in decades. She is indeed, after Vice-President Kamala Harris, the one who would succeed the President, according to American constitutional law. The services of Nancy Pelosi do not confirm so far any next visit, but the leak of this project in the press has already aroused the fury of Beijing.
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“China firmly opposes any form of official exchange between the United States and Taiwan. (…) If Pelosi visits Taiwan, it (…) would have a serious impact on the political foundation of US-China relations and would really send the wrong signal to pro-independence forcesfrom the island, a spokesman for the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs reacted on Tuesday. “If the United States persists in following its own idea (regarding Taiwan), China will take resolute and strong measures to firmly safeguard its national sovereignty and territorial integrity.“, he said.
“One China”
The controversy is unwelcome for Joe Biden, who must speak to his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping “in the next ten days“, he said Wednesday evening. The American president, already grappling with the invasion of Ukraine and a mountain of internal problems, does not want to engage a new front, while tensions around Taiwan are already extremely high. CIA boss Bill Burns recently said that the question was no longer whether China would invade the island, but “when and how“.
Joe Biden had already angered Beijing by saying at the end of May that the United States would intervene militarily to support Taiwan in the event of an invasion by Communist China. He then went back, affirming his attachment to “strategic ambiguity“.
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This deliberately vague concept, which has governed Washington’s Taiwanese policy for decades, consists for the United States of laying down the principle of a “single chinawhose capital is in Beijing, without officially recognizing Taiwan, while supporting the island militarily and without saying whether or not they would intervene militarily to defend it in the event of an invasion.
SEE ALSO – With the Ukrainian example, the question for Beijing is no longer “if” but “when” to invade Taiwan, according to the head of the CIA
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