BEIJING ¨C China on Monday accused Taiwanese President Lai Ching-te of ¡°heresy,¡± hostility and provocation, after a speech in which he said the island is ¡°of course¡± a country and there is historical evidence and legal proof to back this up.
Beijing says democratically governed Taiwan is ¡°sacred¡± Chinese territory that has belonged to China since ancient times, and that the island is one of its provinces with no right to be called a state.
Lai and his government strongly reject that view, and have offered talks with China multiple times but have been rejected. China calls Lai a separatist.
China¡¯s Taiwan Affairs Office, responding to Lai¡¯s Sunday evening speech, said he had intentionally distorted history to promote his Taiwan independence agenda and that the island has never been a country.
¡°It was a ¡¯Taiwan independence¡¯ declaration that blatantly incited cross-strait confrontation, and a hodgepodge of ¡¯Taiwan independence¡¯ fallacies and heresies full of errors and omissions,¡± it said in a statement.
¡°The fallacies fabricated by Lai Ching-te in contravention of history, reality and jurisprudence will only be swept into the rubbish heap of history.¡±
Responding, Taiwan¡¯s China-policy making Mainland Affairs Council said Lai was simply stating historical facts and Beijing¡¯s belief the island has been Chinese since ancient times and is not a country is ¡°just a fabricated lie without any basis.¡±
¡°We call on the Chinese communist authorities to face up to the fact that the Republic of China objectively exists and the status quo in the Taiwan Strait that ¡¯the two sides are not subordinate to each other,¡¯¡± it added in a statement.
In 1949, the Republic of China government fled to Taiwan after losing a civil war with Mao Zedong¡¯s communists, and that remains the island¡¯s formal name.
Lai has repeatedly said that only Taiwan¡¯s people can decide their future, and that, as the People¡¯s Republic of China has never ruled the island, it has no right to claim it or speak on its behalf.
Taiwan has over the past five years faced stepped-up military and political pressure from China, including war games.
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