“Stabilizing relations across the Taiwan Strait is no longer just an issue for the two sides [of the Taiwan Strait]. It is a concern for the whole Indo-Pacific region and has already become a focus of international attention,” Ing-wen said, according to the South China Morning Post (SCMP). “We are willing to facilitate meaningful dialogue under the principles of parity and dignity as long as the Beijing authorities sincerely want to resolve differences and improve cross-strait relations,” she added.
China’s Taiwan Affairs Office (TAO) responded in a statement later that day that the Taiwanese government’s refusal to accept China’s claim over the island was the present tensions’ root cause, according to Reuters. China affirmed its refusal to recognize Taiwan’s independence in the statement.
When the United States finalized a set of seven arms sales packages to Taiwan in August, including 66 upgraded F-16 fighter planes and longer-range air-to-ground missiles that could hit sensitive targets on mainland China, it shifted U.S. policy sharply toward a much more aggressive stance on the geo-strategic island at the heart of military tensions between the United States and China.
Branded “Fortress Taiwan” by the Pentagon, the ambitious arms deal was engineered by Randall Schriver, a veteran pro-Taiwan activist and anti-China hardliner whose think tank had been financed by America’s biggest arms contractors and by the Taiwan government itself.
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