In this photo released by China's Xinhua News Agency, a projectile is launched from an unspecified location in China during long-range live-fire drills by the army of the Eastern Theater Command of the Chinese People's Liberation Army, August 4, 2022. (AP/PTI)Nancy Pelosi Taiwan visit Live Updates: China on Friday said it is suspending dialogue with the United States on issues from climate change to military relations and anti-drug efforts in retaliation for a visit this week to Taiwan by US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, according to AP. This response is the latest in a series of targeted steps intended to punish Washington for allowing the visit to the island it claims as its own territory
This come as China continues to hold threatening military exercises in six zones off Taiwan’s coasts. China’s military exercises aimed at Taiwan, including missiles fired into Japan’s exclusive economic zone, represent a “significant escalation,” said US Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Friday. China’s military drills were launched following a visit earlier this week by US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to Taiwan that infuriated Beijing. Beijing announced sanctions on Pelosi and her family for her Taipei visit.
Taiwan’s defence ministry said Friday that the island’s military is monitoring the situation. Meanwhile, Nancy Pelosi, speaking in Tokyo during the last leg of her Asia visit on Friday, said China made the missile strikes using her Taiwan visit as “an excuse” and that her travel schedule is not set by the Chinese government. She reiterated that the US supports peace and the status quo in Taiwan.
US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, center, walks with Taiwan's Foreign Minister Joseph Wu, left, as she arrives in Taipei, Taiwan, Aug. 2, 2022. (Taiwan Ministry of Foreign Affairs via AP)
➡️ Will cancel dialogues between US and China military leaders.
➡️ Will suspend US-China cooperation on cross-border crime prevention.
➡️ Will suspend US-China maritime safety mechanism talks.
China on Friday said that it is cancelling several defence meetings and suspending key climate talks with the US after US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's Taiwan visit.
China has announced unspecified sanctions on US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi for her visit earlier this week to Taiwan.
A Chinese Foreign Ministry statement said Friday that Pelosi had disregarded China’s concerns and resolute opposition to her visit to the self-ruled island, which Beijing claims.
The Chinese statement called Pelosi’s visit provocative and said it undermines China’s sovereignty and territorial integrity. It said that sanctions would be imposed on Pelosi and her immediate family but did not say what they would be. Such sanctions are generally mostly symbolic in nature.
Chinese foreign ministry has said that it will sanction Nancy Pelosi over her Taiwan visit, reported news agency Reuters.
Japanese officials' recent statements on the current tensions in the Taiwan Strait were an attempt to justify the 'wrongdoers', Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson Hua Chunying said on Friday during a regular briefing.
The harsh remarks from Beijing come after foreign ministers of G7 nations - including Japan - called on China on Wednesday to resolve tension around the Taiwan Strait in a peaceful manner, prompting China to cancel a planned meeting between Foreign Minister Wang Yi and his Japanese counterpart on the sidelines of ASEAN events in Cambodia. (Reuters)
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Friday that China's military exercises aimed at Taiwan including missiles fired into Japan's exclusive economic zone represent a “significant escalation.”
“China has chosen to overreact and use Speaker Pelosi’s visit as a pretext to increase provocative military activity in and around the Taiwan Strait," Blinken said at a news conference in the Cambodian capital. Blinken also said the US stands in “strong solidarity” with Japan following the “dangerous actions China has taken.” (Reuters)
China's firing of missiles around Taiwan is a disproportionate, significant, and unjustified escalation and the United States has made it repeatedly clear to China it does not seek a crisis, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said on Friday.
Blinken told a news conference on the sidelines of the ASEAN Regional Forum that the United States would not be provoked by China and Washington was seriously concerned, adding "there was no possible justification for what they have done." (Reuters)
About 10 Chinese navy ships and 20 military aircraft briefly crossed the Taiwan Strait median line on Friday morning, a Taiwan source briefed on the matter told Reuters.
Around 10 Chinese navy ships crossed the median line and remained in the area on Friday morning, and about 20 Chinese military aircraft briefly crossed the median line, said the person, who declined to be identified due to the sensitivity of the matter.
Earlier, Taiwan's defence ministry said the island's military has dispatched aircraft and ships and deployed land-based missile systems to monitor the situation there, as China conducts large-scale military drills in zones surrounding Taiwan. (Reuters)
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On the Chinese coast across from Taiwan, tourists gathered Friday to try to catch a glimpse of any military aircraft heading toward the exercise area. Fighter jets could be heard flying overhead and tourists taking photos chanted, “Let's take Taiwan back," looking out into the blue waters of the Taiwan Strait from Pingtan island, a popular scenic spot, reported news agency Reuters.
China said it summoned European diplomats in the country to protest statements issued by the Group of Seven nations and the European Union criticising threatening Chinese military exercises surrounding Taiwan.
The Foreign Ministry on Friday said Vice Minister Deng Li made “solemn representations” over what he called “wanton interference in China's internal affairs”.
China had earlier summoned US Ambassador Nicholas Burns to protest Pelosi's visit. (AP)
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken told an Asian meeting of top diplomats on Friday that China's reaction to US house speaker Nancy Pelosi's visit to Taiwan was "flagrantly provocative", a western official said.
Blinken, speaking at the East Asia Summit in Cambodia, said China had sought to intimidate not only Taiwan, but neighbours too, after it launched the largest-ever military drills in the Taiwan Strait, the official said. (Reuters)
China is staging live-fire military drills in six self-declared zones surrounding Taiwan in response to a visit by US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to the island Beijing claims as its own territory.
China has warned aircraft and ships to avoid the areas during the exercises, which run through Sunday. The drills appear to be a rehearsal for a potential blockade and invasion of the island that would almost certainly draw in Taiwan’s chief supporter, the United States, along with American allies including Japan and Australia.
External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar met US Secretary of State Antony Blinken in Cambodia’s capital Phnom Penh on Thursday. The meeting comes at a time when US-China tension is high over US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan.
In his opening remarks at the meeting, which took place on the margins of an ASEAN Foreign Ministers’ meeting, Blinken referred to concerns over “challenges” in Sri Lanka, Myanmar, and the situation in the Indo-Pacific.
Taiwan's defence ministry said on Friday the island's military has dispatched aircraft and ships and deployed land-based missile systems to monitor the situation, as China conducts large-scale military drills in zones surrounding Taiwan.
Multiple Chinese vessels and aircraft crossed the Taiwan Strait median line on Friday morning the defence ministry said, which described China's military activities as highly provocative.
Taiwan's military will prepare combat readiness but will not ask for a war, the defence ministry added. (Reuters)
News agency AFP shared a video of Chinese military helicopters flying past the Pingtan island, which is one of mainland China's closest points to Taiwan, on Thursday.
Apple Inc iPhone assembler Pegatron Corp's mainland China plant is operating normally, the company said in a statement on Friday.
Contrary to media reports, production has not halted, and there is no stoppage in shipments, the Taiwanese firm said. (Reuters)
China summoned the Japanese ambassador in Beijing to lodge stern representations over its participation in an "erroneous" Group of Seven (G7) nations statement on Taiwan, the Foreign Ministry said on Friday.
Chinese Vice Foreign Minister Deng Li issued the diplomatic complaint to Japan's ambassador to China on Thursday, the Foreign Ministry statement said. Earlier, the ministry said it issued a similar complaint to certain European countries and EU envoys to China over the matter. (Reuters)
US House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi said Friday that her trip through Asia, which prompted an infuriated China to hold live-fire military drills in the waters off Taiwan, was never about changing the status quo in Taiwan or the region.
During a news conference in Tokyo, Pelosi addressed the diplomatic storm caused by the congressional visit to Taipei.
"We have said from the start that our representation here is not about changing the status quo in Taiwan or the region," she told a news conference after meeting with Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida. (Reuters)
Speaking in Japan, Nancy Pelosi said China cannot isolate Taiwan by preventing US officials from travelling there, said news agency ANI.
"They may try to keep Taiwan from visiting or participating in other places but they'll not isolate Taiwan by preventing us to travel there...We will not allow them to isolate Taiwan. They're not doing our travel schedule, the Chinese government is not doing that," she said.
She reiterated that US stands by Taiwan, adding "Our friendship with Taiwan is a strong one, it is bipartisan and the House and the Senate's overwhelming support for peace and status quo in Taiwan."
US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, speaking in Tokyo on Friday, said China made the missile strikes using her Taiwan visit as "an excuse".
"Our representation here isn't about changing status quo here in Asia, of Taiwan. It's about Taiwan Relations Act, US-China policy, all pieces of legislation and agreements that established our relationship-have peace in Taiwan Straits and have status quo prevail," she said.
"The Chinese made their strikes, probably using our visit as an excuse. They've tried to isolate Taiwan, keeping them most recently from World Health Organisation by not even letting their participation beyond their agency of World Health Agency that makes these determinations," she added.