Chinese Defense Minister warns Biden administration: ‘Taiwan is an impassable red line for the United States’

Chinese Defense Minister Wei Fenghe warned on Tuesday during a meeting in Cambodia with his US counterpart, Lloyd Austin, that “the Taiwan issue is an impassable red line in Sino-US relations.”

The meeting took place in the Cambodian city of Siem Reap on the sidelines of the summit of defense ministers of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), to which both are invited.

Wei explained to Austin that “the resolution of the issue is a matter for the Chinese people” and warned him “no outside force has the right to interfere” in something that Beijing considers part of its “fundamental interests”, the Chinese Defense Ministry said in a statement today.

The defense minister assured that the responsibility for the current situation in Sino-American relations falls on the US side and urged Washington to “keep its promises” and to “adopt a rational and pragmatic policy towards China”.

“The Chinese military has the trust and the ability to protect with determination the unity of the motherland,” Wei said.

For his part, the spokesman for the Ministry of Defense of the Asian country, Tan Kefei, said today that the talks held in Cambodia are “of considerable importance” to put relations between the two powers “on the path of healthy and stable development. ” “.

Tan, quoted by local media, described the talks as “heartfelt and constructive”.

Today is the first meeting between defense officials from the two powers since their meeting at the Shangri La Dialogue in Singapore last June, before tensions skyrocketed in August following a trip to Taiwan by the then Speaker of the House of US representatives, Democrat Nancy Pelosi.

Beijing responded to the visit with the largest military exercises around the island in decades, as well as trade sanctions on Taipei and the suspension of several high-level talks between China and the United States, including those on defense and climate change.

The leaders of both countries, Joe Biden and Xi Jinping, staged a rapprochement last week on the sidelines of the G20 summit on the Indonesian island of Bali to prevent their tensions from turning into a warlike confrontation.

China, which rated the Pelosi’s visit as ‘farce’ and ‘lamentable betrayal’claims sovereignty over the autonomous island and considers Taiwan a rebel province since the Kuomintang nationalists withdrew there in 1949 after losing the civil war to the communists.

Source: EFE