Chinese military maneuvers: FDP delegation in Taiwan – China warns

Status: 09.01.2023 09:03

A high-ranking FDP delegation has arrived in Taiwan for a four-day visit. China feels provoked – and carried out new military maneuvers off the Taiwanese coast.

The conflict between Taiwan and China, which threatens to invade the democratic island state, has been intensifying for months. A high-ranking FDP delegation has now arrived there. With their visit to Taipei, the members of the Bundestag want to “send a sign of solidarity with Taiwan,” said the chair of the Bundestag Defense Committee, Marie-Agnes Strack-Zimmermann, to the AFP news agency.

During their four-day visit, the German delegation will be received by President Tsai Ing-wen. Meetings with “high-ranking representatives from politics, civil society and the military” are also planned and the current “threat situation” will be discussed, Strack-Zimmermann said. In addition to the President, high-ranking interlocutors are Premier Su Tseng-chang, Foreign Minister Joseph Wu and Speaker of Parliament You Si-kun. The deputies also want to meet with scientists, economic experts and human rights organizations.

China provokes with military maneuvers

Even before the ten-strong delegation landed, China’s People’s Liberation Army began new maneuvers in the Taiwan Straits. According to the Ministry of Defense in Taipei, 57 Chinese military aircraft and four warships were deployed near Taiwan within 24 hours. 28 planes crossed the Taiwan Strait center line and entered Taiwan’s air surveillance zone.

China’s Eastern Command spoke of “joint combat readiness and military patrols as well as real combat exercises.” The aim is to test the abilities of the troops and “resolutely counteract provocative actions by external forces and separatist forces for ‘Taiwan independence’.”

Taiwan condemns China’s exercises

President Tsai Ing-wen’s office has criticized the military maneuvers, saying regional peace and stability is a shared responsibility between Taiwan and China. “Taiwan makes it very clear that it will not escalate a conflict or provoke new disputes, but will defend its independence and security,” the statement said.

China is ramping up military drills in the waters off Taiwan’s coast, fueling tensions in the region.

Image: dpa

Vogel: “After Putin comes Xi”

The First Parliamentary Secretary of the FDP, Johannes Vogel, warned that after Russian President Vladimir Putin’s war against Ukraine, Chinese President Xi Jinping could also unleash a war.

“After Putin comes Xi,” Vogel told AFP. “We have to take the autocrats seriously and literally – because Xi Jinping’s threats of military reunification are a dangerous aspect of the new systems competition with autocracies.” Strack-Zimmermann and Vogel warned that Germany was becoming too dependent on China economically and technologically.

“Not only the Russia policy of the last few years has shown us that it can only be to our disadvantage to make ourselves dependent on autocratic states economically and especially with regard to critical infrastructure,” said Strack-Zimmermann. Germany must also become more independent of China.

Visit causes diplomatic upsets

Criticism came from the Chinese ambassador in Berlin: “With the visit and the comments on it, everyone involved disregards the fact that the forces for ‘Taiwan independence’ and their supporters are challenging China’s sovereignty and territorial integrity,” said Wu Ken. “But I would also like to advise individual politicians not to play with fire on the Taiwan question and not to test Chinese red lines,” he said.

The one-China principle also represents the political basis for the establishment and expansion of diplomatic relations between China and Germany. All previous federal governments have acknowledged this “political obligation”. Part of the so-called One China policy is to recognize the government in Beijing as the sole representative of China.

The Chinese government has always opposed visits by foreign lawmakers to Taiwan, calling them interference in its internal affairs.

China threatens to invade Taiwan

Following the visit of then-US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi in August, Beijing launched large-scale military maneuvers off the coast of Taiwan. The Chinese leadership regards Taiwan as a breakaway part of the People’s Republic. President Xi Jinping threatened to attack Taiwan militarily at the Communist Party Congress in October.

The group of the FDP parliamentary group is the third German delegation to visit Taiwan in the past four months. In October, the Bundestag’s Circle of Friends for Relations with Taiwan and the Human Rights Committee were in Taipei.

FDP Bundestag delegation travels to Taiwan for four days

Kathrin Erdmann, ARD Tokyo, January 9, 2023 7:39 a.m

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