{"id":39776,"date":"2024-06-03T02:33:35","date_gmt":"2024-06-03T02:33:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/?p=39776"},"modified":"2024-06-03T02:33:38","modified_gmt":"2024-06-03T02:33:38","slug":"those-who-back-taiwan-independence-face-self-destruction-chinas-new-defense-minister-warns-in-combative-summit-speech","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/?p=39776","title":{"rendered":"Those who back Taiwan independence face \u2018self-destruction,\u2019 China\u2019s new defense minister warns in combative summit speech"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

CNN: \u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Taiwan is pursuing independence incrementally and those who support it will \u201cend up in self-destruction,\u201d China\u2019s<\/a> new defense minister warned Sunday in a wide-ranging speech at a security summit in Singapore where the extent of regional tensions was on stark display.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Minister of National Defense Adm. Dong Jun made the comments in a roughly 30-minute speech which comes days after Beijing staged major military exercises<\/a> encircling the island of Taiwan after it inaugurated its new, democratically elected president<\/a> last month.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe will take resolute actions to curb Taiwan independence and make sure such a plot never succeeds,\u201d Dong said speaking through a translator, while slamming \u201cexternal interfering forces\u201d for selling arms and having \u201cillegal official contacts\u201d with Taiwan, in an apparent reference to the United States, which maintains close, unofficial ties with Taiwan.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cChina stays committed to peaceful reunification. However, this prospect is increasingly being eroded by separatists for Taiwan independence and foreign forces,\u201d Dong warned.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

His comments come as there has been heightened concern in the region over Beijing\u2019s military and economic intimidation of Taiwan, which has grown more pronounced under Chinese leader Xi Jinping.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In a meeting with Dong<\/a> on Friday, US defense chief Lloyd Austin called on China not to \u201cuse Taiwan\u2019s political transition \u2014 part of a normal, routine democratic process \u2014 as a pretext for coercive measures.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

China\u2019s ruling Communist Party claims the self-governing democracy as its own, despite never having controlled it and has vowed to \u201creunify\u201d with it, by force if necessary. Taiwan\u2019s new President Lai Ching-te and his party, the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), are both openly loathed by Beijing for championing Taiwan\u2019s sovereignty.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lai has said he favors the current status quo, proclaiming that \u201cTaiwan is already an independent sovereign country\u201d so there is \u201cno plan or need\u201d to declare independence. The US also by longstanding policy does not support Taiwan independence nor the unilateral change of the status quo across the Taiwan Strait.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe DPP authorities in Taiwan are pursuing separation in an incremental way. They are bent on erasing their Chinese identity of Taiwan and severing social, historical and cultural links across the Taiwan Strait,\u201d Dong said, reiterating Beijing\u2019s rhetoric that they would be \u201cnailed to the pillar of shame in history.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Polls show growing numbers of the island\u2019s people \u2013 especially young people \u2013 view themselves as distinctly Taiwanese and have no desire to be part of China, an authoritarian one-party state compared to Taiwan\u2019s democracy. Less than 10% now support an immediate or eventual unification, and only 3% identify primarily as Chinese \u2013 while 67% see themselves as primarily Taiwanese.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Taiwan called Dong\u2019s comments in Singapore \u201cprovocative and irrational.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAny\u2026 coercive actions that disregard public opinion run contrary to democracy and human rights, or any resort to war will eventually be counterproductive,\u201d Taiwan\u2019s Mainland Affairs Council said in a statement.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Dong, a former naval commander, is making his debut at the Shangri-la Dialogue security summit after being appointed to his position<\/a> late last year following a surprise shake-up at the top of China\u2019s Defense Ministry.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The gathering plays out amid a contentious security landscape across the region, where China is widely seen by its neighbors as using its military might to assert disputed territorial claims and bid for military prominence in a part of the world where the US has deep security ties.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Chinese vessels and aircraft have been widely documented patrolling and making aggressive maneuvers against others operating in international waters and skies as it asserts disputed claims in the East and South China Seas.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But Dong painted a different vision of China in his speech, framing it as a benign power whose military \u201cnever acts from the so-called position of strength,\u201d while taking oblique aim at the US saying, \u201cwe will not allow anyone to bring geopolitical conflicts or any war, whether hot or cold to our region.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

CNN: \u00a0 Taiwan is pursuing independence incrementally and those who support it will \u201cend up in self-destruction,\u201d China\u2019s new defense minister warned Sunday in a wide-ranging speech at a security summit in Singapore where the extent of regional tensions was on stark display. Minister of National Defense Adm. Dong Jun made the comments in a roughly 30-minute speech which comes days after Beijing staged major military exercises encircling the island of Taiwan after it inaugurated its new, democratically elected president last month. \u201cWe will take resolute actions to curb Taiwan independence and make sure such a plot never succeeds,\u201d Dong said speaking through a translator, while… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":39777,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-39776","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news-in-english"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39776","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=39776"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39776\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":39778,"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39776\/revisions\/39778"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/39777"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=39776"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=39776"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=39776"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}