China on Saturday reiterated its territorial claim to Taiwan, telling world leaders on Saturday that anyone who interferes with its determination to reunify the semi-autonomous island would be “crushed by the wheels of history.”
“Only when China is fully reunified can there be peace across the Taiwan Strait,” Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi told the UN General Assembly. He said that Beijing “will take the strongest steps to oppose external interference.”
China regularly and vehemently defends its claim to Taiwan, which broke away from the country after a civil war in 1949 and now operates an independent government. A recent visit to Taiwan by US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi raised tensions between Washington and Beijing.
The language, though poignant, reflected China’s characteristic intensity on the island, something it rarely mentions in major international speeches. Taiwan is at the center of Chinese foreign policy and Wang’s appearance in place of Chinese leader Xi Jinping at the Assembly was an indication that the speech was not necessarily very important.
“The government of the People’s Republic of China is the only government that represents all of China,” Wang said. “The one-China principle has become a basic norm of international relations.”
China regularly exerts pressure around the world on any entity — country, corporation, and even mapmakers — that even hints that Taiwan is a separate country.
Beijing’s power has isolated the island’s government, but a few UN members continue to have diplomatic relations with Taipei rather than Beijing.
At the UN on Saturday, before Wang, St. Vincent and the Grenadines Prime Minister Ralph Gonsalves spoke forcefully about the need to allow Taiwan to raise its profile in international organizations, including the World Health Organization.
“How can we look sideways, in relative silence and restrained inaction, at Taiwan’s legitimate right to exist in accordance with the wishes and will of the Taiwanese people?” he asked.
