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New Delhi: Taiwan’s Defense Minister Chiu Kuo-cheng on Tuesday warned China against “repeated provocations,” as China’s foreign minister said Taiwan was the “first red line” that must not be crossed in Sino-US relations.
For the past three years, tensions over democratically governed Taiwan, which China claims as its own territory, have increased as Beijing ramps up diplomatic and military pressure to get Taipei to accept Chinese sovereignty, Reuters reported.
Speaking to reporters at parliament, Taiwan’s defense minister said, “The Chinese communists use any reason to send troops. But we won’t just say ‘bring it on’. We will take a peaceful and rational approach.”
Although it hopes this does not happen, Taiwan’s military is prepared to fight, he added.
Chiu further stated, “If the Chinese communists move again, the armed forces’ job is to fight. We won’t allow repeated provocations against us. We can’t accept that.”
According to Reuters, China staged war games near Taiwan in August to protest the Taipei visit of then US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, and Taiwan President Tsai Ing-wen plans to meet current House Speaker Kevin McCarthy in the United States in the coming weeks.
Taiwan’s government has not announced Tsai’s visit to the United States, which previously she has made as stop-overs on the way to countries that maintain formal diplomatic ties with Taiwan in Latin America and the Caribbean.
Taiwan’s foreign ministry said on Tuesday it would make an announcement at an appropriate time about any foreign travel for the president but that it had nothing to announce for the time being. McCarthy has also not confirmed a meeting with Tsai.
Meanwhile, Chinese Foreign Minister Qin Gang said it was “absurd” for US officials to say that Taiwan is not an internal affair of China.
“The Taiwan question is the core of the core interests of China, the bedrock of the political foundation of China-US relations and the first red line that must not be crossed in China-US relations,” he said on the sidelines of China’s annual meeting of parliament.
“The United States has unshakable responsibility for causing the Taiwan question.”
Taiwan’s government strongly disputes China’s territorial claims though has repeatedly offered talks with Beijing, and says only Taiwan’s people can decide their future.
(With inputs from Reuters)
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