Taiwan’s President calls Beijing to act with reason & exercise restraint

Amid rising tension with China following US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s visit, Taiwan’s President Tsai Ing-wen on Thursday called on Beijing to exercise restraint. Tsai Ing-wen said Taiwan will not escalate conflict, but they will defend their sovereignty. "Facing deliberately heightened military threats, Taiwan will not back down. We will... continue to hold the line of defence for democracy," Tsai said at an event with Pelosi in Taipei. The Taiwan President’s remark follows as China conducted “precision missile strikes” in waters off Taiwan’s coasts as part of military exercises that have raised tensions in the region to their highest level in decades following a visit by US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.

With China initiating military exercises in areas around Taiwan today, we call on Beijing to act with reason & exercise restraint. Taiwan will not escalate conflict, but we will resolutely defend our sovereignty, our security & our democracy.https://t.co/CXNli5bTWG

— 蔡英文 Tsai Ing-wen (@iingwen) August 4, 2022

Meanwhile, John Kirby, the US’s National Security Council coordinator for strategic communications, has said that we are watching the Chinese military exercises near Japan “very very closely, In an interview with MSNBC on Thursday, Kirby said that the provocateur here is Beijing. They didn’t have to react this way to what is completely normal travel by congressional members to Taiwan...The Chinese are the ones who are escalating this.