The US has escalated a mounting row on multiple fronts with China, refusing Beijing’s demand to cancel US President Barack Obama’s meeting this week with the Dalai Lama.
The deepening public spat over Tibet, a row over US arms sales to Taiwan, China’s dispute with Google and trade and currency disagreements, come at a key diplomatic moment, as Obama seeks Chinese help to toughen sanctions on Iran.
The White House announced on Thursday that Obama would hold his long-awaited meeting with the Dalai Lama at the White House this week, drawing an angry reaction from China and a demand for the invitation to be rescinded.
But Obama’s spokesman Robert Gibbs signaled the White House would defy China’s warning that the encounter would damage already strained Sino-US relations.
“I do not know if their specific reaction was to cancel it,” Gibbs said. “If that was their specific reaction, the meeting will take place as planned next Thursday.”
Obama avoided the Dalai Lama when he was in Washington last year, in an apparent bid to set relations with Beijing off on a good foot in the first year of a presidency which included several meetings with Chinese President Hu Jintao (胡錦濤).
Obama, however, warned Chinese leaders on an inaugural visit to Beijing in November that he intended to meet the exiled Tibetan spiritual leader.
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Ma Zhaoxu (馬朝旭) said earlier that Beijing firmly opposed “the Dalai Lama visiting the US and US leaders having contact with him.”
“China urges the US ... to immediately call off the wrong decision of arranging for President Obama to meet with the Dalai Lama ... to avoid any more damage to Sino-US relations,” Ma said.
Obama’s meeting with the Dalai Lama will take place in the White House Map Room and not, in an apparent effort to mollify China, in the Oval Office, where US presidents normally meet VIPs and visiting government chiefs.
The International Campaign for Tibet said on Friday it welcomed the meeting.
“We believe that President Obama understands what is at stake for the Tibetan people and has a role to play as the leader of a nation founded on universal principles of freedom and justice,” said Mary Beth Markey, the campaign’s vice president for international advocacy.
Taiwan has arranged for about 8 million barrels of crude oil, or about one-third of its monthly needs, to be shipped from the Red Sea this month to bypass the Strait of Hormuz and ease domestic supply pressures, CPC Corp, Taiwan (CPC, 台灣中油) said yesterday. The state-run oil company has worked with Middle Eastern suppliers to secure routes other than the Strait of Hormuz, through which about 20 percent of the world’s oil and liquefied natural gas typically passes, CPC chairman Fang Jeng-zen (方振仁) said at a meeting of the legislature’s Economics Committee in Taipei. Suppliers in Saudi Arabia have indicated they
South Korea has adjusted its electronic arrival card system to no longer list Taiwan as a part of China, a move that the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said would help facilitate exchanges between the two sides. South Korea previously listed “Taiwan” as “Taiwan (China)” in the drop-down menus of its online arrival card system, where people had to fill out where they came from and their next destination. The ministry had requested South Korea make a revision and said it would change South Korea’s name on Taiwan’s online immigration system from “Republic of Korea” to “Korea (South),” should the issue not be
Tainan, Taipei and New Taipei City recorded the highest fines nationwide for illegal accommodations in the first quarter of this year, with fines issued in the three cities each exceeding NT$7 million (US$220,639), Tourism Administration data showed. Among them, Taipei had the highest number of illegal short-term rental units, with 410. There were 3,280 legally registered hotels nationwide in the first quarter, down by 14 properties, or 0.43 percent, from a year earlier, likely indicating operators exiting the market, the agency said. However, the number of unregistered properties rose to 1,174, including 314 illegal hotels and 860 illegal short-term rental
AIR ALERT: China’s reservation of airspace over the Yellow Sea and East China Sea could be an attempt to test the US’ response ahead of a Trump-Xi meeting, the NSB head said China’s attempts to infiltrate Taiwan are systematic, planned and targeted, with activity shifting from recruiting mid-level military officers to rank-and-file enlisted personnel, National Security Bureau (NSB) Director-General Tsai Ming-yen (蔡明彥) said yesterday. The Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) integrates national security, intelligence operations and “united front” efforts into a dense network to conduct intelligence gathering and espionage in Taiwan, Tsai said at a meeting of the legislature’s Foreign Affairs and National Defense Committee. It uses specific networks to screen targets through exchange activities and recruiting local collaborators to establish intelligence-gathering organizations, he said. China is also shifting who it targets to lower-ranking military personnel,
RSS