China: Tsai, McCarthy meeting would be ‘serious provocation’

Beijing, Mar 29 (EFE).- China said Wednesday that any meeting between Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen and the United States House of Representatives Speaker Kevin McCarthy would be a “serious provocation” to which Beijing would respond.

Zhu Fenglian, Chinese State Council Taiwan Affairs Office spokeswoman, said Taiwanese authorities’ “stopover” in the country is a provocative act to “depend on the US for independence”.

Zhu said the island’s leaders are trying to create incidents that violate the “one China” principle, adding that Washington should strictly abide by it and not facilitate Tsai’s “transit” through the US. She added that the Taiwanese leader shouldn’t communicate with US officials or be helped with practical measures lest it appears as support for “Taiwan independence.”

Tsai will make a stopover in New York on Thursday and Los Angeles on Apr. 5 as part of her trip to Central America, where she will visit Belize and Guatemala, two of the 13 countries that maintain diplomatic ties with Taipei, according to Taiwan’s Presidential Office.

Tsai will arrive in Guatemala on Saturday for a two-day visit in which she will meet her Guatemalan counterpart, Alejandro Giammattei.

In August 2022, the visit to Taiwan of then-US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, angered Beijing, who described it as a “farce” and “deplorable treason.”

In response to the official’s trip, China imposed sanctions on Pelosi, suspended dialogue with the US in several important areas and deployed military maneuvers in the Taiwan Strait of an intensity unprecedented in decades.

China claims sovereignty over Taiwan, which it views as a rogue province since Kuomintang nationalists withdrew there in 1949 after losing the civil war against the communists. EFE

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