Trump says Xi assured him China won't act on Taiwan during his presidency

By Kate Sullivan and Josh Wingrove

 

Donald Trump said Chinese President Xi Jinping told him he would not “move on” Taiwan as long as the US president remained in office. 

Trump, speaking in a Fox News interview on his way to a summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin to discuss a ceasefire more than three years after Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, argued that world leaders — including Xi — would never attempt such an undertaking while he was president.

 

“I don’t believe there’s any way it’s going to happen as long as I’m here,” Trump said. “He’ll never do it as long as you’re president, President Xi told me that.” 

 

 

The US has long sought to deter Beijing from any military action seeking to unify the self-governing island of Taiwan with China by force.

 

While the US is a top military equipment supplier to Taipei, the US has traditionally avoided making an explicit security guarantee, instead maintaining a policy of strategic ambiguity. The 1979 Taiwan Relations Act calls on the US to provide Taiwan the resources to defend itself and opposes any unilateral change in status, but does not explicitly say the US would intervene.

 

During the campaign, Trump suggested in an interview with Bloomberg News that Taiwan “should pay us for defence.”