US President Joe Biden has confirmed that the US remains committed to the ‘One China’ policy.
The One China policy dates back to the 1979 Joint US and China Communique in which the United States recognised Taiwan as part of China.
Biden’s announcement comes after he and Chinese leader Xi Jinping spoke in a virtual summit this week for over three hours.
‘We are not going to change our policy at all,” Biden told reporters on Tuesday, at an event in New Hampshire. “We made very clear we support the Taiwan [Relations] Act and that’s it.’
‘I said that they have to decide, Taiwan, not us,’ he said. ‘We are not encouraging independence, we are encouraging that they do exactly what the Taiwan Act requires.’
The 1979 law governs the relations between the US and the island, which China considers part of its sovereign territory but which has been ruled by the exiled nationalists since 1949, after Communists defeated them in the Chinese civil war.
Meanwhile, Beijing has made it clear that China is prepared to use “decisive measures” to reintegrate the island if necessary. China will never change its position on Taiwan, its ambassador to the EU Zhang Ming said on Tuesday.
‘If anything changes, it is that the Chinese people’s resolve to realize complete reunification of our country grows even stronger,’ he told an online event hosted by a Brussels think tank.
