Flags of the USA and China. File photoWASHINGTON, Aug 30China demands that the United States stop selling arms to Taiwan and renounce military contacts with Taipei in order to avoid further growth of tension in the region, Liu Pengyu, the official representative of the Chinese Embassy in Washington, told RIA Novosti. As the Politico newspaper previously reported, citing unnamed sources, US President Joe Biden intends to soon apply to Congress with a request to approve the sale of American weapons to Taiwan in the amount of about $ 1.1 billion. According to her, we are talking about 60 AGM-84K Harpoon Block II anti-ship missiles and about 100 AIM-9X Block II Sidewinder air-to-air missiles.
"US arms sales to Taiwan seriously violate the "One China" and the provisions of the three joint Sino-US communiqués, encourages pro-Taiwan independence separatist forces, and leads to an escalation of tensions in the Taiwan Strait,» Liu Pengyu said in response to a request for comment on the impending arms sale.
The diplomat urged the United States to «immediately stop selling weapons to Taiwan and contacts with it through the military, stop creating factors that can provoke an increase in tension in the Taiwan Strait, and actually back up the US government's statement of rejection of Taiwan's independence.» At the same time, Liu Pengyu stressed that China «will continue to take strong and effective measures to firmly protect its sovereignty and security interests.»White House: US Navy ships will continue to enter the Taiwan StraitOn Monday, White House National Security Council strategic communications coordinator John Kirby said that Washington intends to continue to provide security assistance to Taiwan, although the United States still does not support the idea of gaining independence. The situation around Taiwan escalated after the visit to the island of the Speaker of the House of Representatives of the US Congress Nancy Pelosi. China, which formally includes the island, condemned the visit, seeing Washington's support for Taiwanese separatism in this step. In response, Beijing held large-scale exercises in the region, restrictive economic measures were introduced against the island, and sanctions were also imposed against Pelosi herself. The government of the PRC and its island province was interrupted in 1949, after the Kuomintang forces led by Chiang Kai-shek, who were defeated in the civil war with the Communist Party of China, moved to Taiwan. Business and informal contacts between the island and mainland China resumed in the late 1980s. Since the early 1990s, the parties began to contact through non-governmental organizations — the Beijing Association for the Development of Relations across the Taiwan Strait and the Taipei Cross-Strait Exchange Foundation. sent 37 aircraft and eight ships to Taiwan