US Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Friday said that tensions have eased with China as he prepares for a rare visit, but he renewed alarm over Beijing’s intentions over Taiwan.
Asked in an appearance at the University of Chicago if the temperature had subsided with China, Blinken replied: “I think so, because when you’re talking and engaging, it tends to have that effect.”
“The rest of the world expects us to manage this relationship responsibly. They know that the way we manage it is actually going to affect them, too,” he said.
Photo: AFP
Blinken is to visit Beijing from Feb. 5 to 6, a US official said, in the first trip by a US secretary of state to the rising Asian power since October 2018.
The trip was decided after US President Joe Biden and Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) in November held talks in Bali, Indonesia, on wide-ranging friction between the world’s two largest economic powers.
However, Blinken again voiced alarm over Taiwan, pointing to Beijing’s growing efforts to isolate the nation and the major military exercises it carried out near it in August.
“What we’ve seen over the last few years is, I think, China make a decision that it was no longer comfortable with the status quo, a status quo that had prevailed for decades that had actually been successful in terms of the relationship between our countries and managing what is a difficult situation,” he said.
“What we say to China is this — they say this is a sovereign issue for us; our response is this is an interest to the United States and to countries around the world,” Blinken said, pointing to Taiwan’s dominance in semiconductors crucial for the global economy.
Any disruption of the peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait would be a disaster to the world economy, he said, adding that 50 percent of container ships operating around the world go through the Taiwan Strait and 70 percent of higher-end computer chips are manufactured in Taiwan.
Blinken was on a trip to Chicago that included visiting the midwestern metropolis’ historic Ukrainian community to discuss the response to Russia’s invasion.
Additional reporting by CNA
CREDIT-GRABBER: China said its coast guard rescued the crew of a fishing vessel that caught fire, who were actually rescued by a nearby Taiwanese boat and the CGA Maritime search and rescue operations do not have borders, and China should not use a shipwreck to infringe upon Taiwanese sovereignty, the Coast Guard Administration (CGA) said yesterday. The coast guard made the statement in response to the China Coast Guard (CCG) saying it saved a Taiwanese fishing boat. The Chuan Yu No. 6 (全漁6號), a fishing vessel registered in Keelung, on Thursday caught fire and sank in waters northeast of Diaoyutai Islands (釣魚台). The vessel left Keelung’s Badouzih Fishing Harbor (八斗子漁港) at 3:35pm on Sunday last week, with seven people on board — a 62-year-old Taiwanese captain surnamed Chang (張) and six
LEVERAGE: China did not ‘need to fire a shot’ to deny Taiwan airspace over Africa when it owns ‘half the continent’s debt,’ a US official said, calling it economic warfare The EU has raised concerns about overflight rights following the delay of President William Lai’s (賴清德) planned state visit to the Kingdom of Eswatini after three African nations denied overflight clearance for his charter at the last minute. Taiwanese allies Paraguay and Saint Kitts and Nevis, as well as several US lawmakers and the Inter-Parliamentary Alliance on China (IPAC) condemned China for allegedly pressuring the countries. Lai was scheduled to fly directly to Taiwan’s only African ally from yesterday to Sunday to celebrate the 40th anniversary of King Mswati III’s accession and his 58th birthday, but Seychelles, Mauritius and Madagascar suddenly revoked
RISKY BUSINESS: The ‘incentives’ include initiatives that get suspended for no reason, creating uncertainty and resulting in considerable losses for Taiwanese, the MAC said China’s “incentives” failed to sway sentiment in Taiwan, as willingness to work in China hit a record low of 1.6 percent, a Ministry of Labor survey showed. The Directorate-General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics (DGBAS) also reported that the number of Taiwanese workers in China has nearly halved from a peak of 430,000 in 2012 to an estimated 231,000 in 2024. That marked a new low in the proportion of Taiwanese going abroad to work. The ministry’s annual survey on “Labor Life and Employment Status” includes questions respondents’ willingness to seek employment overseas. Willingness to work in China has steadily declined from
The number of pet cats in Taiwan surpassed that of pet dogs for the first time last year, reaching 1,742,033, a 32.8 percent increase from 2023, the Ministry of Agriculture said yesterday, citing a survey. By contrast, the number of pet dogs declined slightly by 1.2 percent over the same period to 1,462,528, the ministry said. Despite the shift, households with dogs still slightly outnumber those with cats by 1.2 percent. However, while the number of households with multiple dogs has remained relatively stable, households keeping more than two cats have increased, contributing to the overall rise in the feline population. The trend
RSS