US Assistant Secretary of State Kurt Campbell has formally asked China to rethink its new passports, which include a map showing Taiwan and the South China Sea as Chinese territory.
“We’re obviously joining the chorus of countries who are urging the Chinese to reconsider the political signal that this appears to send,” US Department of State spokesperson Victoria Nuland said at a press briefing on Thursday.
The US has held two meetings with China — both of them at the Department of State’s Washington offices — and remains unsatisfied with Beijing’s responses.
Asked if US concerns had not been assuaged, Nuland said: “Correct.”
Nuland, pressed to give details of the meetings, said: “We have been raising this passport issue over the last couple of days.”
“It obviously applies not only to the South China Sea, but the Indian side has expressed concerns about some of their territory being chopped into this map. So, the conversation is about all of it,” she said.
On Wednesday, a deputy assistant secretary of state spoke to the Chinese about the new passport map and it was after that meeting apparently led nowhere that Campbell became involved on Thursday.
Nuland said she did not think that any of the countries involved in the dispute had actually asked Washington for help on the issue.
“But obviously we have concerns if they have concerns,” she said.
Nuland said the US was concerned that the issue might raise tensions in the region “so that’s the context in which we’re bringing it up with the Chinese.”
Taiwan has joined a number of governments in the region in criticizing Beijing for including the map — as well as pictures of Taiwanese beauty spots Nantou’s Sun Moon Lake and Hualien’s Chingshui Cliffs — in the new passports. Parts of the South China Sea claimed by China on the map are also claimed by Taiwan, Vietnam, Brunei, Malaysia and the Philippines.
The new passports are seen as a provocation because when other nations stamp them it could be taken as a tacit endorsement of China’s territorial claims.
In her briefing, Nuland referred to a statement made earlier this week by Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesman Hong Lei (洪磊).
“The picture on the passport should not be overinterpreted,” Hong said. “China is ready to maintain communication with relevant countries and promote the sound development of personnel exchanges.”
Nuland was also asked during her briefing about reports that Hainan Province had authorized border patrol police to board and turn away foreign ships entering disputed waters in the South China Sea.
“We’ve seen the same press reports that you have seen,” she said. “We are going to be asking some questions of the Chinese government about this, frankly, to get a better understanding of what they intend,” she said.
Taiwan has received more than US$70 million in royalties as of the end of last year from developing the F-16V jet as countries worldwide purchase or upgrade to this popular model, government and military officials said on Saturday. Taiwan funded the development of the F-16V jet and ended up the sole investor as other countries withdrew from the program. Now the F-16V is increasingly popular and countries must pay Taiwan a percentage in royalties when they purchase new F-16V aircraft or upgrade older F-16 models. The next five years are expected to be the peak for these royalties, with Taiwan potentially earning
STAY IN YOUR LANE: As the US and Israel attack Iran, the ministry has warned China not to overstep by including Taiwanese citizens in its evacuation orders The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) yesterday rebuked a statement by China’s embassy in Israel that it would evacuate Taiwanese holders of Chinese travel documents from Israel amid the latter’s escalating conflict with Iran. Tensions have risen across the Middle East in the wake of US and Israeli airstrikes on Iran beginning Saturday. China subsequently issued an evacuation notice for its citizens. In a news release, the Chinese embassy in Israel said holders of “Taiwan compatriot permits (台胞證)” issued to Taiwanese nationals by Chinese authorities for travel to China — could register for evacuation to Egypt. In Taipei, the ministry yesterday said Taiwan
Taiwan is awaiting official notification from the US regarding the status of the Agreement on Reciprocal Trade (ART) after the US Supreme Court ruled US President Donald Trump's global tariffs unconstitutional. Speaking to reporters before a legislative hearing today, Premier Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰) said that Taiwan's negotiation team remains focused on ensuring that the bilateral trade deal remains intact despite the legal challenge to Trump's tariff policy. "The US has pledged to notify its trade partners once the subsequent administrative and legal processes are finalized, and that certainly includes Taiwan," Cho said when asked about opposition parties’ doubts that the ART was
If China chose to invade Taiwan tomorrow, it would only have to sever three undersea fiber-optic cable clusters to cause a data blackout, Jason Hsu (許毓仁), a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute and former Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) legislator, told a US security panel yesterday. In a Taiwan contingency, cable disruption would be one of the earliest preinvasion actions and the signal that escalation had begun, he said, adding that Taiwan’s current cable repair capabilities are insufficient. The US-China Economic and Security Review Commission (USCC) yesterday held a hearing on US-China Competition Under the Sea, with Hsu speaking on
RSS