US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Thursday that he hopes China “does not manufacture a crisis” in the wake of US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan. .
“I hope that Beijing does not fabricate a crisis or find a pretext to increase its aggressive military activity,” Blinken said in Phnom Penh at the beginning of his meeting with representatives of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations.
The head of US diplomacy stressed that Washington maintains its interest in “maintaining peace and stability” in the Taiwan Strait and warned that an escalation “does not benefit anyone, including the members of ASEAN and including China.”
“I want to stress that nothing has changed in our position,” said Blinken, who warned that an escalation of tension “can have unintended consequences that are of no interest to anyone.”
Blinken made these statements during the meeting of ASEAN foreign ministers that is being held in the Cambodian capital until Friday and in which Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi also participates, among others.
The Chinese Army today began its military exercises with live fire around Taiwan, which have caused “a sea and air blockade” of the island, according to the Taiwanese Ministry of Defense.
The maneuvers, which start a day after Pelosi’s controversial visit to Taipei, include the closure of maritime and air space in six areas around the island and have affected 18 international air routes and more than 900 flights have been forced to modify your route.
Taiwan, with whom the US does not maintain official relations, is one of the main sources of conflict between China and the US, mainly because Washington is the main supplier of weapons to the island and would be its greatest military ally. in case of war conflict with the Asian giant.
China insists on “reunifying” the People’s Republic with the island, which has been governed autonomously since the Kuomintang (KMT) nationalists withdrew there in 1949 after losing the civil war against the communists and continued with the regime of the Republic of China, culminating in the transition to democracy in the 1990s.