Foreign Minister Wang Yi says relations with Washington are at a critical juncture
Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi (L) and US Secretary of State Antony Blinken in Nusa Dua, Indonesia, July 2022. © Stefani Reynolds / AFP
The US must change its attitude towards China so the two powers can get along on the world stage, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi said during a meeting with his US counterpart, Antony Blinken, in New York on Friday.
“China-US relations are at a critical juncture, and it is urgent for both sides to establish a correct way for the two major countries to get along with each other in a responsible attitude towards the world,” Wang told Blinken, according to a statement from the Chinese Foreign Ministry.
Wang added that by pledging to defend Taiwan, Washington is undermining China’s sovereignty and “sending a very wrong and dangerous signal.”
China considers the self-governing island its territory and opposes any form of foreign diplomatic and military aid to Taipei. “The issue of Taiwan is China’s internal affair, and the US has no right to interfere,” Wang said.
We hope that the US will correct its perception of China … and stop trying to deal with the Chinese from a position of strength.
According to US State Department spokesman Ned Price, Blinken spoke about the need to maintain open lines of communication with Beijing and stressed that Washington is “committed to maintaining peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait, consistent with our longstanding ‘one-China’ policy.”
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CNN quoted a senior US official as describing the conversation between Wang and Blinken as “extremely candid, direct, constructive and in-depth.”
Speaking to CBS News last week, President Joe Biden said the US would defend Taiwan in case of a Chinese invasion. However, the White House later clarified that Washington continues to maintain ‘strategic ambiguity’ on the matter.
Last month, China strongly protested the visit of US House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi to Taiwan, who became the highest-ranking US official to make the trip since the 1990s. Beijing retaliated by launching major military drills around the island.
