TAIPEI, May 11 — Taiwan is confident in the stable development of its ties with the United States (US), but hopes there are no "surprises" on Taiwan-related issues when Donald Trump visits China this week, said Foreign Minister Lin Chia-lung.
The US President will be in Beijing from Wednesday (May 13) to Friday (May 15) for a summit with Chinese President Xi Jinping, where the issue of democratically governed Taiwan, which China views as its territory, is certain to come up.
Beijing has never renounced the use of force to bring Taiwan under its control, and last month, China's Foreign Minister said Taiwan was the "biggest risk" in China-US relations. Taiwan's government rejects China's sovereignty claims.
Washington is bound by law to provide Taiwan with the means to defend itself, and last week, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said that there needed to be stability across the Taiwan Strait.
Speaking to the media at the Legislative Yuan in Taipei today, Lin said the government is closely monitoring the upcoming Trump-Xi meeting.
"We have also maintained continuous communication with the United States, whether through public statements from the US government or through non-public channels. We are confident in the stable development of Taiwan-US relations.
"The U.S. government has repeatedly expressed that its Taiwan policy will not change," he said.
Taking questions from lawmakers later, Lin noted that the US is clear on the issues it wants discussed, such as trade and fentanyl, but China kept raising the Taiwan issue.
"Of course, we hope that the Trump-Xi summit does not produce any surprises regarding Taiwan-related issues," he said.
Defence spending stymied
The US has pushed Taiwan, along with its major allies around the world, to spend more on their defence.
But last week, Taiwan's Opposition-controlled Parliament passed a smaller special defence budget than the government had requested and removed clauses for spending on domestically developed systems such as surface-to-air missiles and drones.
On Sunday, a senior US official said the US was disappointed that Parliament approved defence spending short of what Washington believed was needed.
Lin said he hoped Parliament could take "remedial" action so that the defence budget could support Taiwan's security policy, as maintaining peace and stability in the Taiwan Strait was a common goal shared by Taiwan and like-minded nations.
"However, peace depends on strength: it requires demonstrating the defence capability for self-defence in order to deter aggression," he said.
Speaking at a separate event in Taipei, Premier Cho Jung-tai said the government would "certainly take action" to restore the international community's trust in Taiwan's defence policy.
"Having it fragmented in this way is a serious blow to defence and security," he said.
China has continued its regular military activities around Taiwan in the run-up to Trump's China trip, including holding another "joint combat readiness patrol" last week.
On Saturday (May 9), China's Defence Ministry said such operations were "entirely justified and reasonable".
"'Taiwan independence' is the root cause of destabilising peace in the Taiwan Strait, and we will absolutely not tolerate or condone it," said ministry spokesman Jiang Bin.
