The island signs a contract for 83.3 million dollars with the Biden administration for the maintenance of its PAC-3 missiles until 2026
The United States is stepping up trade with Taiwan and making new air and sea crossings across the strait separating the island from mainland China in response to Beijing’s “provocative” actions, a senior US official said on Friday.
An “ambitious roadmap” for the trade relationship will be released “in a few days,” while US forces will transit the Taiwan Strait “in the next few weeks,” Kurt Campbell, White House coordinator for security, told reporters. affairs of the Asia-Pacific region, reports Afp.
This adviser to President Joe Biden stated that Beijing had used the recent and controversial visit to Taiwan by the Speaker of the US House of Representatives, Nancy Pelosi, to try to alter the current situation regarding the island, which China claims as part of its territory.
The visit by Pelosi, the highest-ranking US official to visit Taiwan in years, was “consistent” with current Washington policy, Campbell said, noting that China “overreacted”.
Beijing used this pretext to “launch an intensified pressure campaign against Taiwan to try to change the status quoendangering peace and stability in the Taiwan Strait and in the region in general,” he said.
China’s actions “remain provocative, destabilizing and unprecedented,” Campbell said.
Following Pelosi’s visit, Beijing launched multi-day air and sea maneuvers around Taiwan. In response, the United States reaffirmed its commitment to the region.
Campbell said that the Biden administration will “continue to deepen” (its) ties with Taiwanincluding through the continuous advancement of the economic and commercial relationship”.
US forces “will continue to fly, sail or operate where international law allows,” he said, without specifying the nature of the deployments to the strait or when they will be.
Regarding China’s recent decision to stop cooperating with Washington on key issues such as the fight against climate change, Campbell said that they have and will keep “open lines of communication with Beijing.”
The government of Taiwan applauded the US announcement.
In a statement, the Foreign Ministry expressed “sincere appreciation” for his “concrete actions to maintain security in the Taiwan Strait and peace in the region.”
Taiwan maintains its PAC-3 missiles with the US
Taiwan signed with the US a $83.3 million contract for him maintenance of its PAC-3 missiles until 2026collect media from the island today, reports Efe.
The agreement was signed between the Taiwanese Government Defense Mission in the US and the American Institute of Taiwan after a restricted tender, according to the official Taiwanese agency CNA, citing sources familiar with the negotiation.
According to said medium, the contract seeks to ensure the proper functioning and reliability of the Patriot missilesTaiwanese as the armament accumulates years in operation.
Taiwan has had PAC-3 missiles since 2007, when it began to update its defensive system, in which until then it had PAC-2 missiles.
A military source quoted anonymously by CNA indicated that the maintenance of the missiles it is crucial for the air defense of the islandwhich between 2025 and 2026 will receive two new shipments of PAC-3 purchased in 2021.
In July 2020, China sanctioned the US-based arms company Lockheed Martin for reaching a pre-agreement with Taiwan worth 620 million dollars to repair and fine-tune PAC-3 missiles.
Beijing has intensified its protests in recent years over the sale of US weapons to the island self-governed, whose sovereignty claims China by considering it a rebellious province since the nationalists of the Kuomintang withdrew there after losing the civil war against the communists in 1949.
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George is Digismak’s reported cum editor with 13 years of experience in Journalism