The US hit out at China's newly-adopted "anti-secession" law Monday, describing it as an "unfortunate" and "unhelpful" action that could increase tensions.
The legislation, adopted earlier in the day by China's rubber-stamp National People's Congress, "does not serve the purpose of peace and stability in the Taiwan Strait," said White House press secretary Scott McClellan.
Responding to the law's authorizing the use of "non-peaceful means" against Taiwan, McClellan said: "We oppose any attempts to determine the future of Taiwan by anything other than peaceful means."
PHOTO: GEORGE TSORNG, TAIPEI TIMES
"We don't want to see any unilateral attempts that would increase tensions in this region. So this is not helpful," he said.
McClellan also repeated that the administration does not support Taiwan's independence.
The anti-secession law is certain to come up during Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice's trip to Asia this week, which will include a stop in Beijing later in the week.
"We will be, I am sure, talking about Taiwan during the course of the trip," State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said.
"Our view remains that they need to move in the direction of peaceful dialogue. She will encourage them to do that, and look forward to hearing from them as to how they might be willing to move in that direction," and what they might be willing to do, he said.
On the eve of her trip, Rice criticized the law, saying "it raises tensions, and it's not necessary or a good thing to raise tensions."
In an interview on Sunday morning television, Rice described the US as "an upright anchor in this dispute for a long time."
"The key is that there should be no effort on either side to unilaterally change the status quo," she said, adding that it is "far too early to make conclusions" about whether the law invalidates the long-standing assumption that as China becomes more prosperous, it will become more peaceful.
Meanwhile, the Republican congressional leadership apparently is still resisting pressure to pass a resolution condemning the anti-secession law. An agenda for this week's floor activity in the House, where such resolutions usually get their first airing, contains no provision for debating or voting on either of two resolutions introduced by House members last month urging the Bush administration to strongly oppose the anti-secession law.
As the administration voiced its concerns over the new Chinese law Monday, the State Department also cautioned the Chen administration from taking potentially incendiary countermeasures.
"We have urged both sides to avoid any steps that raise tensions. We have encouraged both sides to avoid any steps to try to define unilaterally some kind of solution to their differences," Boucher said.
But he declined to answer directly a question about the planned March 26 demonstrations against the law or any other action Chen might take.
"I don't have any particular view of a demonstration or a counter-reaction, as hypothetical as it is right now," he said.
"The issues between Taiwan and [China] need to be solved in dialogue. Neither side is going to get anywhere with unilateral steps," he reiterated.
Boucher could not say whether the passage of the law will have an impact on US efforts to convince the EU not to go through with its plans to lift its arms embargo on China.
But he said that the prospect of a Chinese attack on Taiwan "should be disserving to the Europeans as it is to us."
PRECISION STRIKES: The most significant reason to deploy HIMARS to outlying islands is to establish a ‘dead zone’ that the PLA would not dare enter, a source said A High Mobility Artillery Rocket System (HIMARS) would be deployed to Penghu County and Dongyin Island (東引) in Lienchiang County (Matsu) to force the Chinese military to retreat at least 100km from the coastline, a military source said yesterday. Taiwan has been procuring HIMARS and Army Tactical Missile Systems (ATACMS) from the US in batches. Once all batches have been delivered, Taiwan would possess 111 HIMARS units and 504 ATACMS, which have a range of 300km. Considering that “offense is the best defense,” the military plans to forward-deploy the systems to outlying islands such as Penghu and Dongyin so that
WHAT WAS ALL THAT FOR? Jaw Shaw-kong said that Cheng Li-wen had pushed for more drastic cuts and attacked him, just for the outcome to be nearly identical to his bill The legislature yesterday passed a supplementary budget bill to fund the purchase of separate packages of US military equipment, with the combined amount of spending capped at NT$780 billion (US$24.8 billion). The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) used their legislative majority to pass the bill, which runs until 2033 and has two main funding provisions. One was for NT$300 billion of arms sales already approved by the US for Taiwan on Dec. 17 last year, the other was for NT$480 billion for another arms package expected to be announced by Washington. The bill, which fell short of the NT$1.25
‘CLEAR MESSAGE’: The bill would set up an interagency ‘tiger team’ to review sanctions tools and other economic options to help deter any Chinese aggression toward Taiwan US Representative Young Kim has introduced a bill to deter Chinese aggression against Taiwan, calling for an interagency “tiger team” to preplan coordinated sanctions and economic measures in response to possible Chinese military or political action against Taiwan. “[Chinese President] Xi Jinping [習近平] has directed the People’s Liberation Army to be ready to invade Taiwan by 2027. China has a plan. America should have one too,” Kim said in a news release on Thursday last week. She introduced the “Deter PRC [People’s Republic of China] aggression against Taiwan act” to “ensure the US has a coordinated sanctions strategy ready should
A former television news host and six military personnel — active and retired — have been indicted on espionage charges, Kaohsiung prosecutors said yesterday. Lin Chen-you (林宸佑), a former CTi News host and YouTuber, last year allegedly made videos at the direction of a Chinese agent criticizing the Democratic Progressive Party’s recall campaign, the Ciaotou District Prosecutors’ Office told a news conference in Kaohsiung. He allegedly received 4,325 tether coins for the videos from an unidentified person surnamed Huang (黃), believed to be an agent of a hostile foreign power, they said. Lin, also known as Ma Te (馬德), has a show named
RSS