May 10, 2023
United States Secretary of State Antony Blinken met with United Kingdom Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs James Cleverly on May 9. In a joint press conference held after the meeting, the two foreign secretaries reiterated their joint position on preserving peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait.
Secretary Blinken emphasized the shared approach of the United States and the United Kingdom on such key issues as “ensuring peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait, as well as on looking for ways to cooperate with China to solve major global challenges.” Foreign Secretary Cleverly echoed this by stating that in order to advance global interests, both the United Kingdom and the United States had to engage with China directly, robustly, and regularly to seek to influence the decisions that are made in Beijing. He added that this included the maintenance of peace across the Taiwan Strait, which affected people worldwide.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) of the Republic of China (Taiwan) welcomes and appreciates the US and UK foreign secretaries reiterating their firm stance on safeguarding peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait.
Peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait lie at the core of security and prosperity in the Indo-Pacific region. Since 2022, China has unjustifiably escalated its coercion and military intimidation against Taiwan, posing serious challenges to regional security and stability and drawing significant concern from the international community.
The statements by the US and UK foreign secretaries once again underscore the high degree of consensus among the international democratic community on maintaining peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait, which are of great significance to global interests and should be jointly safeguarded by democratic partners. MOFA will continue to work with the United States, the United Kingdom, and other like-minded partners to uphold democratic values and safeguard peace, stability, and prosperity across the Taiwan Strait and throughout the region.
Related Links:
United States Department of State press release
United States Secretary of State Antony Blinken:
“The vision that James set out a few weeks ago in his speech at Mansion House underscores the shared approach when it comes to key issues like ensuring peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait, as well as looking for ways to cooperate with China where we can work together to solve big challenges.”
United Kingdom Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs James Cleverly:
“And we have to engage with China directly, robustly, regularly, to seek to influence the decisions that are made in Beijing and do so in a way that benefits the whole world, whether that be on the maintenance of peace across the Taiwan Strait, which of course is something which affects all of us irrespective of where we are in the world, to issues such as climate change, pandemic prevention and response.”