Taiwan\u2019s new president said on Sunday he was still ready to work with China, despite this week\u2019s military drills around the self-ruled island. The drills began around Taiwan on Thursday, just three days after Lai Ching-te was sworn in, part of an escalating campaign of intimidation by China which views the island as part of its territory. During the two-day drills, China vowed that what it described as \u201cindependence forces\u201d would be left \u201cwith their heads broken and blood flowing\u201d. Lai told reporters on Sunday that he wanted Taiwan and China to \u201cjointly shoulder the important responsibility of regional stability\u201d. \u201cI also look forward to enhancing mutual understanding and reconciliation through exchanges and cooperation with China [\u2026] and moving towards a position of peace and common prosperity,\u201d he said at an event in Taipei. Communications between China and Taiwan were severed in 2016 after former president Tsai Ing-wen of the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) took office, pledging to defend Taiwan\u2019s sovereignty. Lai, also a DPP member, had vowed to maintain Tsai\u2019s policies of building up Taiwan\u2019s defence capabilities, while remaining open to dialogue with China and strengthening relations with the island\u2019s partners \u2014 particularly the United States. Wen-ti Sung, a non-resident fellow at the Atlantic Council\u2019s Global China Hub, told AFP that Lai would \u201chold firm to project resolve\u201d during this first interaction between his administration and Beijing. \u201cHowever he will no doubt be looking to leverage other international partners and friends to help facilitate more back-channel communications with Beijing,\u201d Sung said. Pakistan regards Taiwan as inalienable part of China: PM Meanwhile, Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif said on Sunday that Pakistan would continue to extend support to China on its position on Taiwan. \u201cAs an iron-brother and a strategic partner of China, Pakistan has always extended its principled support to the Chinese position on Taiwan and will continue to do so,\u201d he said in a post on social media platform X. \u201cPakistan adheres to \u2018One China\u2019 policy, regards Taiwan as an inalienable part of the People\u2019s Republic of China and supports the Chinese government\u2019s efforts for national reunification,\u201d he said. \u201cThe so-called elections or transition of the self-proclaimed government in Taiwan do not change the objective facts on the Taiwan issue,\u201d he added. Intimidation tactics Since 2016, Beijing has upped military and political pressures on Taiwan, and its naval vessels, drones and warplanes maintain a near-daily presence around the island. Experts say Beijing is seeking to intimidate and exhaust Taiwan\u2019s military monitoring its activities. On Sunday, two days after the drills ended, Taiwan\u2019s defence ministry reported that seven Chinese aircraft, 14 naval vessels and four coast guard ships were \u201coperating around\u201d the island in a 24-hour period ending at 06:00am (2200 GMT Saturday). The ministry also said in a separate statement that it had found a cardboard box containing political slogans that it said was left by Beijing on a dock in Erdan, an islet part of Taiwan-controlled Kinmen next to China\u2019s Xiamen. The defence ministry shrugged off the incident, saying it suspected it was intended to create online chatter. \u2018Major test\u2019 Lai\u2019s first week in office also saw tens of thousands take to the streets of Taipei to protest bills proposed in parliament by the opposition Kuomintang \u2014 regarded as pro-Beijing \u2014 and Taiwan People\u2019s Party. DPP lawmakers have been accusing the opposition of forcing the bills \u2014 which expand parliament\u2019s powers \u2014 through without proper consultation. With Lai\u2019s DPP no longer holding the majority in parliament, his party will face challenges in passing his administration\u2019s policies, such as bolstering the defence budget. \u201cThe pressures are coming fast and early for the Lai administration,\u201d Amanda Hsiao of the International Crisis Group told AFP. \u201cThis is going to be a major test of their ability to manage multiple challenges, domestic and external, at the same time. \u201c<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Taiwan\u2019s new president said on Sunday he was still ready to work with China, despite this week\u2019s military drills around the self-ruled island. The drills…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":17467,"comment_status":"registered_only","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[12],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-17466","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-world"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.diplomacypakistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17466","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.diplomacypakistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.diplomacypakistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.diplomacypakistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.diplomacypakistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=17466"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.diplomacypakistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17466\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.diplomacypakistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/17467"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.diplomacypakistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=17466"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.diplomacypakistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=17466"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.diplomacypakistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=17466"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}