SHANGHAI: Two influential Chinese newspapers on Monday warned US President-elect Donald
Trump that
Beijing will "take off the gloves" and
Taiwan may be sacrificed if he
continues to provoke
Beijing over the self-ruled island once he sworn in on Jan 20.
In an interview with the Wall Street Journal published on Friday,
Trump said the "One China" policy was up for negotiation.
China’s foreign ministry said "One China" was the foundation of China-US ties and was **n-negotiable.
Trump broke with decades of precedent last month by taking a congratulatory telephone call from
Taiwan President Tsai Ing-wen, angering
Beijing which sees
Taiwan as part of China.
"If
Trump is determined to use this gambit in taking ******, a period of fierce, damaging interactions
will be unavoidable, as
Beijing will have ** choice but to take off the gloves," the English-language China Daily said.
The Global Times, an influential state-run tabloid, echoed the China Daily, saying
Beijing would take "strong countermeasures" against Trump’s attempt to "impair" the One China principle.
"The Chinese mainland
will be prompted to speed up
Taiwan reunification and mercilessly combat those who advocate Taiwan’s independence," the paper said in an editorial.
It said Trump’s endorsement of
Taiwan was merely a ploy to further his administration’s short term interests, adding: "Taiwan may be sacrificed as a result of this despicable strategy".
"If you do **t beat them until they are bloody and bruised, then they
will **t retreat," Yang Yizhou, deputy head of the All-China Federation of
Taiwan Compatriots, told an academic meeting on cross-straits relations in
Beijing on Saturday.
Taiwan independence must "pay a cost" for every step forward taken, "we must use bloodstained facts to show them that the road is blocked," Yang said, according to a Monday report on the meeting by the official People’s Daily Overseas Edition.
The United States, which switched diplomatic recognition from Taipei to
Beijing in 1979, has ack**wledged the Chinese position that there is only "one China" and that
Taiwan is part of it.
The China Daily said Beijing’s relatively measured response to Trump’s comments in the Wall Street Journal "can only come from a genuine, sincere wish that the less-than-desirable, yet by-and-large manageable, big picture of China-US relations
will **t be derailed before
Trump even enters ******".
But China should **t count on the assumption that Trump’s
Taiwan moves are "a pre-inauguration bluff, and instead be prepared for him to continue backing his bet".
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