প্রকাশ: 06/08/2022
China announced on
Friday it was halting dialogue with the United States in a number of areas,
including between theatre-level military commanders and on climate change, in a
furore over US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's visit to Taiwan.
China's foreign ministry said it was also suspending
exchanges with Washington on countering cross-border crime and drug
trafficking, all moves Washington called "irresponsible."
Enraged when Pelosi became the highest-level US visitor in
25 years to the self-governed island that Beijing regards as its territory,
China launched military drills in the seas and skies around Taiwan on Thursday.
The live-fire drills, the largest ever conducted by China in the Taiwan Strait,
are scheduled to continue until noon on Sunday.
Taiwan's defence ministry said on Friday it scrambled jets
to warn away Chinese aircraft that it said entered the island's air defence
zone, some of which crossed the Taiwan Strait median line, an unofficial buffer
separating the two sides.
A total of 68 Chinese military aircraft and 13 navy ships
had conducted missions in the strait, the ministry said.
China's Eastern Theatre Command of the People's Liberation
Army (PLA) said in a statement it conducted air and sea drills to the north,
southwest and east of Taiwan on Friday "to test the troops' joint combat
capabilities."
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Washington has
repeatedly made clear to Beijing it does not seek a crisis over Pelosi's visit
to Taiwan earlier this week during a congressional tour of Asia.
"There is no justification for this extreme,
disproportionate and escalatory military response," he told a news
conference on the sidelines of Asean regional meetings in Cambodia, adding,
"Now, they've taken dangerous acts to a new level".
Blinken emphasised that the United States would not take
actions to provoke a crisis, but it would continue to support regional allies
and conduct standard air and maritime transit through the Taiwan Strait.
"We will fly, sail and operate wherever international law
allows," he said.
A US official, speaking on the condition of anonymity, said
Chinese officials had not responded to calls made by senior Pentagon officials
this week, but the move was seen as China showing displeasure over the Pelosi
trip rather than severing the channel between senior defence officials
including US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin.
Chinese foreign minister Wang Yi told a media briefing after
the Asean meetings: "I heard that US Secretary of State Blinken held his
news conference and spread some misinformation and was not speaking
truthfully."
"We wish to issue a warning to the United States: Do
not act rashly, do not create a greater crisis," Wang said.
Jing Quan, a senior Chinese Embassy official in Washington,
echoed that, telling a briefing: "The only way out of this crisis is that
the US side must take measures immediately to rectify its mistakes and
eliminate the grave impact of Pelosi's visit."
He said Washington should "avoid pushing China-US
relations down the dangerous track of conflict and confrontation".
Diplomatic Front
"There's nothing here for the United States to rectify.
The Chinese can go a long way to taking the tensions down simply by stopping
these provocative military exercises and ending the rhetoric," Kirby told
reporters.
China has not mentioned a suspension of military talks at
the senior-most levels, such as with US Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin and
Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Mark Milley. While those talks
have been infrequent, officials have said they are important to have in the
case of an emergency or accident.
Kirby said it was not atypical for China to shut down
military talks at times of tension, but that "not all channels"
between the two countries' military leaders had been cut off.
The Pentagon said China was overreacting and that Washington
was still open to building crisis communication mechanisms.
"Part of this overreaction has been strictly limiting its
defence engagements when any responsible state would recognize that we need
them now the most," Acting Pentagon spokesman Todd Breasseale said.
Beijing separately announced that it would impose sanctions
on Pelosi personally and her immediate family in response to her
"vicious" and "provocative" actions. read more
Speaking at a news conference in Japan after meeting
Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida, Pelosi said her trip to Asia was
"not about changing the status quo in Taiwan or the region."
Stay Calm
Taiwan's defence ministry said on Friday the island's
military had dispatched aircraft and ships and deployed land-based missile
systems to monitor ships and aircraft that briefly crossed the Taiwan Strait
median line.
On Thursday, China fired multiple missiles into waters
surrounding Taiwan.
Japan's defence ministry, which is tracking the exercises,
first reported that as many as four of the missiles flew over Taiwan's capital,
which is unprecedented. It also said that five of nine missiles fired toward
its territory landed in its exclusive economic zone (EEZ), also a first,
prompting a diplomatic protest by Tokyo.
Later, Taiwan's defence ministry said the missiles were high
in the atmosphere and constituted no threat.
Some Taipei residents, including Mayor Ko Wen-je, criticised
the government for not putting out a missile alert, but one security expert
said that could have been done to avoid stoking panic and playing into China's
hands.
"It counteracted the effect of the Chinese Communist
Party's psychological warfare," said Mei Fu-shin, a US-based analyst.
Taiwan's President Tsai Ing-wen urged residents not to
panic, saying in a Facebook post: "Please rest assured, stay calm and live
as normal."
Bonnie Glaser, a Washington-based Asia security specialist
at the German Marshall Fund of the United States, said China may be rehearsing
for a blockade, "demonstrating it can block Taiwan's ports and airports
and prevent shipping."
Taiwan has been self-ruled since 1949, when Mao Zedong's
communists took power in Beijing after defeating Chiang Kai-shek's Kuomintang
(KMT) nationalists in a civil war, prompting the KMT-led government to retreat
to the island.
Beijing has said its relations with Taiwan are an internal
matter, and that it reserves the right to bring Taiwan under Chinese control,
by force if necessary.
- Reuters
প্রধান সম্পাদকঃ সৈয়দ বোরহান কবীর
ক্রিয়েটিভ মিডিয়া লিমিটেডের অঙ্গ প্রতিষ্ঠান
বার্তা এবং বাণিজ্যিক কার্যালয়ঃ ২/৩ , ব্লক - ডি , লালমাটিয়া , ঢাকা -১২০৭
নিবন্ধিত ঠিকানাঃ বাড়ি# ৪৩ (লেভেল-৫) , রোড#১৬ নতুন (পুরাতন ২৭) , ধানমন্ডি , ঢাকা- ১২০৯
ফোনঃ +৮৮-০২৯১২৩৬৭৭