TAIPEI, Taiwan – Nancy Pelosi, speaker of the House, arrived in Taiwan on Tuesday, ignoring separate warnings from the Biden administration about the risk that her high-level diplomatic visit could trigger a meeting new crisis in Asia and immediately prompted a strong response from the Chinese government.
A US military jet carrying Ms. Pelosi landed in Taipei late at night after weeks of speculation about her travel plans. Her decision to continue her trip – shrouded in official secrecy until the very last moment – made her the highest-ranking congressional official to visit the disputed island in a quarter of a century and caused a stir. strained relations with China that US officials say could result. to apply more active military.
“The solidarity of the United States with Taiwan’s 23 million people is more important today than ever, as the world faces a choice between autocracy and democracy,” she said in a statement released on Friday. was greeted by Joseph Wu, Taiwan’s foreign minister, adding that the visit did not contradict US policy on Taiwan.
China, which has always challenged any of its claims about self-ruled Taiwan, has repeatedly warned Ms. Pelosi against making the visit. Shortly after her arrival, Beijing announced plans for live-fire military exercises, some in areas that overlap with the island’s territorial waters. In a separate statement, the People’s Liberation Army said it would begin a series of joint naval and air exercises including “long-range live-fire firing in the Taiwan Strait.”
The drills will temporarily block access to some of Taiwan’s commercial shipping lanes and ports, but analysts say they appear to be designed to project power rather than make money subject for a Chinese invasion of Taiwan.
“They don’t signal that we are about to go to war,” said Joe McReynolds, senior China analyst at the Washington-based Center for Intelligence Research and Analysis. However, he and others said the rapidly evolving situation could lead to a chance encounter that could spiral out of control.
Before the visit, the United States had urged Beijing not to turn the moment into a crisis. Following last week’s phone call between Chinese Presidents Biden and Xi Jinping, China’s foreign ministry condemned Ms. Pelosi’s scheduled visit, saying “playing with fire will set yourself on fire.”
But Ms. Pelosi, a longtime critic of China who visited Tiananmen Square two years after the Chinese military opened fire on student protesters there, was defiant. In her statement, she said her visit to the island 80 miles off the Chinese coast was a sign of the US’s “unwavering commitment” to supporting Taiwan’s democracy.
“We must side with Taiwan, a resilient island,” Pelosi said in an article published on the Washington Post website after landing. In the article, she called Taiwan “a leader in governance”, a “leader in peace, security and economic dynamism” and a “vibrant, strong democracy”.
In Taiwan’s central business district, the Taipei 101 building, once the tallest building in the world and an important landmark in the city’s skyline, was lit up with messages welcoming Ms. The highest-ranking American official to the island since 1997, when Newt Gingrich, then Speaker of the House, visited.
Ms. Pelosi’s refusal to be encouraged to take the trip was fitting for her decades-long efforts hold China accountable for its actions. She has repeatedly pushed for legislation to benefit Hong Kong and Tibet; welcoming His Holiness the Dalai Lama, the spiritual leader of Tibet; and called for a diplomatic boycott of the Olympics in Beijing.
Her strong stance on Tuesday was echoed in a rare statement of bipartisan support released shortly after her arrival: More than two dozen Republican senators, including Kentucky’s Mitch McConnell , the minority leader, wrote that her trip was “in line with America” China policy to which we were committed. “
“She is a senior official in the US government. But it’s not unusual,” said Senator Bob Menendez of New Jersey, Democratic Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. “I was there three months ago with five other senators. We have a long history of visiting Taiwan. And so we cannot let the Chinese say who can and cannot visit Taiwan.”
But the speaker’s arrival was greeted with disdain by Chinese officials, who accused Ms. Pelosi of undermining China’s sovereignty. And her visit comes as China’s leader, Xi Jinping, has made it clearer than any of his predecessors that he views the reunification of Taiwan with China as a key goal of his rule. .
Mr. Xi, who has led China since 2012, is expected to be confirmed to an unprecedented third term of leadership at the Communist Party congress in the fall. On the eve of that important political meeting, Mr. Xi was keen to project a picture of strength at home and abroad, especially on the Taiwan issue.
A statement released by the Chinese Communist Party’s Taiwan Affairs Office said any attempt to claim Taiwan’s independence would “be foiled by the powerful force of the Chinese people”.
Long a sore point in the increasingly tense relationship between the US and China, Taiwan – whose military and democratically elected government – has emerged as the front line in the struggle for territory. politics of influence and power in Asia.
Under Mr. Xi, China’s most powerful leader in decades, Beijing has taken stronger military actions in the region and has recently made strong claims about the strait separating Taiwan. Loan and China, one of the busiest shipping lanes in the world. Mr. Xi has called for the reunification of Taiwan as part of China’s national rejuvenation process, possibly even by force.
The United States sent a steady stream of senior officials to show solidarity with Taiwan. Biden recently said he would act to defend Taiwan in the event of a conflict. It was It’s not the first time he’s done thisbut White House officials have repeatedly denied those claims, saying an age-old policy of “strategic ambiguity” about defending Taiwan still applies.
Publicly, senior White House officials say that Ms. Pelosi’s visit does not represent any change in official policy and should be viewed by China as no different from any visit to Taiwan. recent members of Congress.
But privately, administration officials have made it clear to Ms. Pelosi that her decision to visit Taiwan appears to be provoking China at a time when tensions between the two nations are high and the United States is engaged. help Ukraine fight war with Russia.
Ms. Pelosi’s visit has embarrass Mr. Biden. The speaker and her staff emphasized that, as the leader of a separate but universal branch of the US government, she has the right to go wherever she wants. And Biden’s aides insist he doesn’t want to be seen as the one who dictates where she can travel.
Officials said Mr. Biden never told Ms. Pelosi not to go. But officials made clear that her trip could significantly escalate tensions, including the possibility of China using the visit to justify military action against Taiwan.
As the plane carrying Ms. Pelosi approached Taiwan, some Chinese state media reported that Chinese Su-35 fighter jets were crossing the strait, a statement Taiwan’s Defense Ministry called “hearsay”. The last time China sent an aircraft across the median line down the strait was in 2020, when Alex Azar, US Secretary of Health and Human Services, visited Taiwan.
China claims Taiwan as its territory and has vowed to take it back by force if necessary. In a phone call with Mr Biden on Thursday, the Chinese leader warned the US not to interfere in the dispute.
China’s incursions into the airspace and waters near Taiwan have become more aggressive over the past few years, increasing the risk of conflict.
In June, Beijing raised the bar when the Ministry of Foreign Affairs stated that China has jurisdiction over the Taiwan Strait and that it cannot be considered a international waterways. And in the past year, Chinese military aircraft have increasingly explored airspace near Taiwan, causing Taiwanese fighters to scramble.
Huang Chao-yuan, a 53-year-old business owner, went to an area near Songshan airport to watch Ms. Pelosi’s plane land. She said the speaker’s visit was a “historic moment” “showing Taiwan’s independence”.
But outside the Grand Hyatt Taipei, where Ms. Pelosi is expected to stay overnight, several dozen advocates of reunification with China protested Ms. Pelosi’s visit: Some called for her to “get out of Taiwan.” , and some held banners denouncing her.
In Beijing, she was seen as hostile to the regime and its goals.
A two-term congresswoman from California, Pelosi visited Beijing in 1991, two years after the Chinese military opened fire on student protesters around Tiananmen Square, killing dozens. hundreds if not thousands of people. The square was accompanied by a number of congressional colleagues and a small group of reporters, Ms. Pelosi unfurled a banner in memory of the deceased students.
Ms. Pelosi is a strong supporter of the Dalai Lama and the rights of Tibetans. In 2015, with official permission from the Chinese government, she visited Lhasa, the capital of Tibet, on a tightly controlled trip. The area is usually off-limits to foreign officials and journalists.
From the student protest in Beijing in 1989 to the anti-government protest in Hong Kong 30 years later, Ms. supported social movements that criticized China’s ruling Communist Party. She also urged China’s leaders to refrain from their authoritarian policies, criticism of which has prompted harsh criticism from Chinese officials.
The San Francisco Chinese community that Ms. Pelosi represents, ostensibly pro-Taiwan from the 1950s until the early 1990s. Today, it is more connected to the mainland, in part due to its tendency to import. immigration and the rise of China’s power and influence in the world, Mr. Lee said.
Dozens of people gathered in San Francisco on Monday to protest the trip, arguing it could spark a potential war with China. The protest included members of the city’s Chinese-American community; Code Pink: Women for Peace, an anti-war group; and the United States-China People’s Friendship Association.
Paul Mozur and Amy Chang Chien reported from Taipei, and Michael D. Shear from Washington. Report contributed by Emily Cochrane and Amy Qin from Washington, Thomas Fuller from San Francisco, Jane Perlez and Mike Ives from Seoul, and John Liu from Taipei. Claire Fu Contributing research.
