WASHINGTON — House Speaker Nancy Pelosi highlighted strong support for Taiwan as she wrapped her visit Wednesday. China announced it would conduct live-fire military drills in response to her controversial visit to the self-governed island.
Pelosi, who met with Taiwan’s top leaders then departed, addressed threats from Beijing, saying she hopes it’s clear that while China has prevented Taiwan from attending certain international meetings, “that they understand they will not stand in the way of people coming to Taiwan as a show of friendship and of support.”
During a short speech in a meeting with Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen, Pelosi said she and other members of her congressional delegation would uphold their commitment to the self-governing island.
“Today the world faces a choice between democracy and autocracy,” she said. “America’s determination to preserve democracy, here in Taiwan and around the world, remains ironclad.”
As she landed Tuesday, Pelosi emphasized the U.S. must stand by Taiwan in the face of intensifying Chinese aggression.
Taiwan denounced China’s planned drills, saying they violate sovereignty and equate to the “sealing off” of the island “by air and sea.”
China’s official Xinhua News Agency announced the military actions Tuesday night, along with a map outlining six different areas around Taiwan. Arthur Zhin-Sheng Wang, a defense studies expert at Taiwan’s Central Police University, said three of the areas infringe on Taiwanese waters, meaning they are within 12 nautical miles of shore.
The latest:
- Pelosi honored: Tsai, thanking Pelosi for her decades of support for Taiwan, presented the speaker with a civilian honor, the Order of the Propitious Clouds.
- Beijing bites back: The trip has roiled the Chinese government, which warned that Pelosi was “playing with fire” and said it views the trip as “a serious violation” of the one-China policy the U.S. has pledged to adhere to.
- No change in policy: In Washington, the Biden administration stressed that its policy toward Taiwan has not changed. Pelosi echoed that sentiment in an op-ed that published after she had landed.
- 25 years later: Pelosi is the first House speaker to visit Taiwan in a quarter century. Former GOP House Speaker Newt Gingrich also visited in 1997.
Top takeaways
Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan comes as tension between the United States and China continues to rise. And the White House has walked a tight line in responding to the House speaker’s trip.
John Kirby, the strategic coordinator for the National Security Council, said Tuesday that Pelosi’s trip is “totally consistent” with United States policy. However, when asked whether the White House agrees with Pelosi’s statement that America stands with Taiwan, Kirby said he will “let the speaker speak for herself.”
“Nothing has changed about our adherence to the One China policy,” Kirby said. “Nothing has changed about our stance on Taiwan independence, which is that we do not support Taiwan independence.”
Although the White House has distanced itself from some of Pelosi’s comments, the administration expects China’s coercive actions to continue even after Pelosi’s trip concludes.
Kirby said the White House expects to continue to see Beijing react “over a longer term horizon” and beyond Pelosi’s trip, noting additional large-scale live fire exercises and economic coercion.
“The United States will not and does not will not seek and does not want a crisis,” Kirby said. “We are prepared to manage what Beijing chooses to do. At the same time, we will not engage in saber-rattling.”
“We will continue to operate in the seas in the skies of the Western Pacific as we have done for decades,” he continued. “We will continue to support Taiwan, defend a free and open Indo Pacific and seek to maintain communication with Beijing. We’ll keep doing what we are doing, which is supporting cross strait peace and stability.”
What they are saying
- “Madam Speaker’s visit to Taiwan with the delegation, without fear, is the strongest defense of upholding human rights and consolidation of the values of democracy and freedom,” Tsai Chi-chang, vice president of Taiwan’s legislature, said in welcome.
- “He respects the speaker’s decision to travel to Taiwan,” John Kirby, the strategic coordinator for the National Security Council, said of Biden on Tuesday.
- China’s Defense Ministry said Pelosi “insisted on making the wrong move, maliciously provoking and creating the crisis.”
- Kirby emphasized that the Biden administration “will not seek and does not want a crisis” in Taiwan during a press briefing heavily focused on Pelosi’s visit.
- “We will not engage in saber rattling,” Kirby said. “We will continue to support Taiwan, defend a free and open Indo-Pacific and seek to maintain communication with Beijing.”
- Pelosi wrote in a op-ed in the Washington Post that the visit by U.S. lawmakers “in no way contradicts the long-standing one-China policy.”
- “Our visit reiterates that America stands with Taiwan: a robust, vibrant democracy and our important partner in the Indo-Pacific,” she said in a tweet.
- Sen. Bob Menendez, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations committee, in an op-ed, highlighted Pelosi’s visit as a reason Congress should pass a bipartisan bill that restructures U.S. policy towards Taiwan: “The United States must be clear: Using (Pelosi’s) visit as an excuse for performative sound and fury is simply that: a pretext for more aggressive steps that China has been preparing to take anyway. That is why Ms. Pelosi was right in not letting China decide who can and cannot visit Taiwan.”
- Hua Chunying, assistant minister of Foreign Affairs of the People’s Republic of China, accused Pelosi of trying to “undermine China’s stability.”
- “This is a typical example of ‘you can’t wake a person who is pretending to be asleep,’” Chunying wrote on Twitter. “This exposes her sinister motive of using human rights as a pretext to interfere in other countries’ internal affairs, undermine China’s stability and containing China’s development.”
Want to know more? Here’s what you missed:
► Why Nancy Pelosi is visiting Taiwan despite China’s threats and pleas from Biden
►Why Taiwan is the biggest flashpoint in the increasingly fraught US-China relationship
►Pelosi lands in Taiwan:Nancy Pelosi visits Taiwan, angering China, which warns she’s ‘playing with fire’
Contributing: Rebecca Morin, Associated Press
