HONG KONG — China has warned House Speaker Kevin McCarthy not to “repeat disastrous past mistakes” by meeting with Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen this week, saying it would undermine regional peace and stability and worsen U.S.-China relations.
The Taiwanese government dismissed criticism of the planned meeting, which it confirmed would take place in California on Wednesday. Tsai’s transit through the United States has fueled new threats from Beijing as relations between the world’s two largest economies spiral.
Taiwan’s Foreign Ministry said criticism of Tsai’s trip by China’s ruling Communist Party, which has never controlled Taiwan, had become “increasingly absurd.”
“Even if the authoritarian government continues to expand and increase coercion, Taiwan will not back down,” it said in a statement on Tuesday.
McCarthy’s office said Monday that the bipartisan meeting would take place at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley, Calif., as Tsai transits through the United States following a trip to Guatemala and Belize, two of Taiwan’s 13 remaining formal diplomatic allies. It will be her second U.S. transit after a stop in New York last week, her first time in the country since 2019.
China has repeatedly warned against any meeting between Tsai and McCarthy, who as House speaker is second in line for the presidency, and threatened retaliatory measures. It sees such outreach by U.S. officials as an expression of support for the independence of Taiwan, a self-ruling island democracy that Beijing claims as its territory.
A Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson criticized the planned meeting as a violation of the one-China principle, under which Washington recognizes Beijing as the sole legitimate government of China while maintaining unofficial relations with Taipei.
China will closely monitor the situation and “resolutely defend our sovereignty and territorial integrity,” the spokesperson, Mao Ning, said at a regular…
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