US admiral’s visit to Taiwan irks Beijing
‘ We’ve got your back’ in South China Sea, Trump adviser tells Philippines, Vietnam
BEIJING/ MANILA ( Reuters) – China will respond to the reported visit of a US Navy admiral to Taiwan and firmly opposes any military relations between Taipei and Washington, the Chinese Foreign Ministry said on Monday, as a senior US official praised their ties with Taipei.
A two- star Navy admiral overseeing US military intelligence in the Asia- Pacific region made the unannounced visit to Taiwan, two sources told Reuters on Sunday. Neither Taiwan nor the United States has officially confirmed the trip.
The Trump administration has ramped up support for Taiwan, including with new arms sales, alarming China, which views the democratic island as one of its provinces with no right to statetostate ties.
Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian said China “resolutely opposes” any form of exchanges between US and Taiwanese officials or the two having military relations.
China urges the US to fully recognize the extreme sensitivity of the Taiwan issue, Zhao told a news briefing.
“The Chinese side will, according to how the situation develops, make a legitimate and necessary
response,” he said, without elaborating.
China reacted with fury when US Health Secretary Alex Azar came to Taipei in August, followed by US Undersecretary of State Keith Krach in September, sending warplanes near to the island each time.
Speaking during a visit to Manila, US National Security Advisor Robert O’Brien on Monday assured the Philippines and Vietnam, countries both locked in maritime rows with China, that Washington has their backs and would fight to keep the Indo- Pacific region free and open.
“Our message is we’re going to be here, we’ve got your back, and we’re not leaving,” said O’Brien, on a visit to the Philippines after concluding a trip to Vietnam on Sunday.
“I think when we send that message – that peace- throughstrength message – is the way to deter China. It is a way to ensure the peace,” O’Brien said.
Vietnam and the Philippines have been the most vocal regional opponents to what they see as Chinese overreach in the South China Sea and its disregard for boundaries outlined in international maritime law.
China claims 90% of the potentially energy- rich South China Sea, but Brunei, Malaysia, the Philippines, Taiwan and Vietnam each claim parts of it.
The United States has long opposed China’s expansive claims, sending warships regularly through the strategic waterway to demonstrate freedom of navigation there.
China maintains it is a force for peace in the region and sees the US presence as provocative and interference by an outsider.
O’Brien, who led the turnover in Manila of $ 18 million worth of precision- guided munitions, said the US stood with the Philippines in protecting its offshore resource entitlements.
“Those resources belong to the children and grandchildren of the people here,” he said.
“They don’t belong to some other country that just because they may be bigger than the Philippines,” he said, adding: “That’s just wrong.”
His visit came more than a week after the Philippines suspended its scrapping of a Visiting Forces Agreement ( VFA) with the United States for a second time, as the treaty allies work on a long- term mutual defense arrangement.