The presidents of Taiwan and the United States have expressed their mutual willingness to engage in direct dialogue, an unprecedented gesture between sitting leaders of both governments that could jeopardize the relative stability of relations between Washington and Beijing.
“In addition to being committed to maintaining the stable status quo in the Taiwan Strait, President [William] Lai is also happy to discuss these matters with President [Donald] Trump,” Taiwan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs indicated in an official statement sent to the EFE news agency on Thursday.
Trump stated on Wednesday that he would speak with the Taiwanese President, just one week after an official state visit to Beijing where he said he “talked a lot” about the island with his Chinese counterpart, Xi Jinping. “I’ll speak to him; I speak to everybody,” Trump declared to reporters at Joint Base Andrews in Maryland when questioned about whether a direct dialogue with the Taiwanese leader would be possible, an action that Beijing considers a strict red line.
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“We have that situation very well in hand, we’ll work on that, the Taiwan problem,” the American leader added, linking the potential talks to a pending 14-billion-dollar military sales package. The sitting presidents of the United States and Taiwan have not maintained direct communications since Washington broke formal diplomatic ties with Taipei to establish relations with Beijing in 1979.
Trump, who leads Taiwan’s primary military ally, warned the island’s leadership last week against any formal proclamation of independence, reiterating that he wants stability and cross-strait peace. “I don’t want someone to declare independence and then expect us to travel 9,000 miles to go to war,” the US President stated during a televised interview broadcast by Fox News.
In December, the United States approved its second weapons sale to Taiwan since Trump returned to power, valued at 11.1 billion dollars, but a decision on additional defense requests remains pending. Trump noted that he discussed Taiwan “all night long” with Xi Jinping during his visit, while Chinese state media reported that Xi explicitly warned that mismanagement of the issue could push the two nations into conflict.
