Views in Taiwan are “hardening” in favor of independence after China’s moves in the past few years to tighten control over Hong Kong, the head of the US intelligence community said on Thursday.
“I would say that already Taiwan is hardening, to some extent, toward independence as they’re watching, essentially, what happened in Hong Kong, and I think that is an increasing challenge,” US Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines said in testimony before the US Senate Armed Services Committee.
Questions about China dominated the “Worldwide Threats” hearing with Haines and US Lieutenant General Scott Berrier, the head of the Defense Intelligence Agency.
Photo: Bloomberg
US-China ties have remained tense into US President Joe Biden’s administration, which has continued to criticize Beijing’s actions in Hong Kong, Xinjiang and the South China Sea. Haines previously called China an “unparalleled priority” for the intelligence community.
The spy chief was pressed by US Senator Jack Reed, the panel’s chairman, on the impact that a shift clarifying the US’ long-held position of “strategic ambiguity” on defending Taiwan if it is attacked would have in Beijing and Taipei. Such a move would involve the US saying definitively that it would come to Taiwan’s aid in the case of an attack.
China “would find this deeply” destabilizing, and it would “solidify Chinese perceptions that the US is bent on constraining China’s rise, including through military force,” Haines said.
Berrier said he sees a “significant” threat from China’s rapid modernization of its military, saying that the Chinese People’s Liberation Army is capable of placing nuclear warheads on its next-generation hypersonic missiles.
China is increasingly using technology to try to “gain near-real-time tracking and observation” of Pentagon personnel and activities, he added.
Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesman Wang Wenbin (汪文斌) yesterday told a regular briefing that Beijing is determined to uphold its “sovereignty and territorial integrity.”
“The US should sufficiently recognize the harmful and dangerous nature of Taiwan independence,” he said.
A record 32 percent of Taiwan’s public favors immediate or eventual independence, according to a poll in December last year by the Election Study Center at National Chengchi University.
That figure comes as Beijing tightens its political grip over Hong Kong, in part by imposing national security legislation on the territory.
Still, 54 percent of the survey respondents expressed a preference for maintaining the “status quo” in the Taiwan Strait.
Rainfall is expected to become more widespread and persistent across central and southern Taiwan over the next few days, with the effects of the weather patterns becoming most prominent between last night and tomorrow, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. Independent meteorologist Daniel Wu (吳德榮) said that based on the latest forecast models of the combination of a low-pressure system and southwesterly winds, rainfall and flooding are expected to continue in central and southern Taiwan from today to Sunday. The CWA also warned of flash floods, thunder and lightning, and strong gusts in these areas, as well as landslides and fallen
WAITING GAME: The US has so far only offered a ‘best rate tariff,’ which officials assume is about 15 percent, the same as Japan, a person familiar with the matter said Taiwan and the US have completed “technical consultations” regarding tariffs and a finalized rate is expected to be released soon, Executive Yuan spokeswoman Michelle Lee (李慧芝) told a news conference yesterday, as a 90-day pause on US President Donald Trump’s “reciprocal” tariffs is set to expire today. The two countries have reached a “certain degree of consensus” on issues such as tariffs, nontariff trade barriers, trade facilitation, supply chain resilience and economic security, Lee said. They also discussed opportunities for cooperation, investment and procurement, she said. A joint statement is still being negotiated and would be released once the US government has made
SOUTH CHINA SEA? The Philippine president spoke of adding more classrooms and power plants, while skipping tensions with China over disputed areas Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr yesterday blasted “useless and crumbling” flood control projects in a state of the nation address that focused on domestic issues after a months-long feud with his vice president. Addressing a joint session of congress after days of rain that left at least 31 dead, Marcos repeated his recent warning that the nation faced a climate change-driven “new normal,” while pledging to investigate publicly funded projects that had failed. “Let’s not pretend, the people know that these projects can breed corruption. Kickbacks ... for the boys,” he said, citing houses that were “swept away” by the floods. “Someone has
‘CRUDE’: The potential countermeasure is in response to South Africa renaming Taiwan’s representative offices and the insistence that it move out of Pretoria Taiwan is considering banning exports of semiconductors to South Africa after the latter unilaterally downgraded and changed the names of Taiwan’s two representative offices, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) said yesterday. On Monday last week, the South African Department of International Relations and Cooperation unilaterally released a statement saying that, as of April 1, the Taipei Liaison Offices in Pretoria and Cape Town had been renamed the “Taipei Commercial Office in Johannesburg” and the “Taipei Commercial Office in Cape Town.” Citing UN General Assembly Resolution 2758, it said that South Africa “recognizes the People’s Republic of China (PRC) as the sole