While Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen is expected to be a guest of the United States in the coming weeks, a senior US official warned China against escalation.
He stressed, in press statements, today, Tuesday, that Washington sees no justification for China to use this upcoming “normal” visit as an excuse to intensify any aggressive activity around the Taiwan Strait.
He also made it clear that the US administration is asking China to keep high-level communication channels open, according to Reuters.
In addition, he considered that there was nothing new in Tsai’s visit, and it did not differ from previous visits that took place, and therefore it should not be loaded more than it bears.
On the other hand, the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs denounced that visit, confirming its rejection of it under any name or title.
Sino-American tension
The upcoming visit comes as tensions between Beijing and Washington have reached their highest levels in years due to US support for the island, which included visits by senior politicians months ago, which provoked China.
Last August (2022), the Chinese army conducted massive military maneuvers in response to the visit of the then Speaker of the US House of Representatives, Nancy Pelosi, to Taiwan. Especially since Beijing views the visits of foreign governments to the island as an actual recognition of its independence and a challenge to China’s claim to sovereignty over it.
In its biggest military maneuvers targeting Taiwan in decades, China sent ships and planes regularly across the median line of the strait, and even fired missiles over Taiwan itself that ended up landing in Japan’s exclusive economic zone.
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In return, Taiwan sought to ask the United States to increase its military support. Washington had already agreed months ago to sell more weapons to Taipei, including $619 million worth of ammunition for F-16 fighter jets.
Beijing considers Taiwan part of its territory, and it has escalated its military and diplomatic harassment during the last period.
It is noteworthy that the two sides have been divided since the civil war in 1949, and the Chinese Communist Party has not controlled the island since then. However, Beijing has repeatedly hinted in the past years the importance of annexing the island to the Chinese mainland, by all means, including military if necessary, which exacerbated the fears of Taipei, which resorted to its American ally, to provide it with more weapons.
