Former British Prime Minister Liz Truss warned the West against trying to appease China in her visit to the democratically governed island of Taiwan this week. Truss also stressed the need to support the island nation, which China claims as its territory.
On Wednesday, Truss delivered remarks at the Taipei-based think tank, the Prospect Foundation, where she warned against appeasing Beijing while stressing the importance of supporting Taiwan. Truss is the most well-known British politician to visit the island. The former British prime minister said Beijing was using its global economic reach to “gain dominance” and take on “the biggest military buildup in peacetime history.”
“We have to do all we can to support free democracies like Taiwan in the face of aggression from a Chinese regime whose record we already know,” said Truss, adding that many nations in the West have chosen to appease China out of not wanting another Cold War.
“The only choice we have is: Do we appease and accommodate that strategy or do we take action now to prevent conflict,” said the former prime minister.
China has opposed any interaction between foreign governments in Taiwan. Taiwan has repeatedly rejected Beijing’s claims of sovereignty over the island, saying that China has never ruled the island and only its people can decide its future.
Earlier this week, the speaker of the Taiwanese parliament, You Si-kun, praised Japan, the Philippines, and South Korea for what he referred to as a “crescent of defense” with the island nation and the United States against China’s expansionist ambitions in the region.
In remarks at the Hudson Institute in Washington, You said that China’s ruling Communist Party and President Xi Jinping saw Taiwan as a “stepping stone” to global hegemony.
You also said that protecting Taiwan would also ensure the defense of Europe and the US and praised South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol and Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida for referring to Taiwan as a global issue and opposing the potential use of force by Beijing. You also cited comments by Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. in granting the US access to more Philippine military bases being a useful defensive measure if China were to invade.
“The crescent of defense formed by Korea, Japan, Taiwan, and the Philippines will, with American support, be a key stabilizer of peace and security in the Indo-Pacific region,” said You.
Photo: Simon Liu (Office of the President)/Wikimedia Commons(CC by 2.0)