Taiwan’s top security officials visit US for secret talks – FT

Regular meetings between Washington and Taipei have reportedly been kept under wraps to avoid Beijing’s criticism

Taiwan’s top foreign policy officials visited the US this week for secret meetings known as ‘special channel’ talks, the Financial Times reported on Thursday, citing sources. It’s the first such visit since Taiwanese President Lai Ching-te took office in May.

China opposes contacts between Washington and Taipei, calling the Taiwanese issue its “red line.” Beijing has previously accused the US of weakening the One China policy, which states that Taiwan is an integral part of Chinese territory. 

People familiar with the trip to Washington by Taiwanese officials said that foreign minister Lin Chia-lung and Joseph Wu, Taiwan’s national security adviser, visited the Washington area for the channel, seen as a “rare opportunity for a larger group of senior officials from both sides to hold detailed talks.” The sources did not disclose the location or the timing of the discussions.

According to the report, the US and Taiwan have held secret ‘special channel’ talks for years, though their existence was first disclosed by FT in 2021. Both sides have kept the channel under wraps to avoid China’s criticism, it said.

The last special channel was held in February 2023, the report added, noting that under a long-standing practice Taiwan’s foreign and defense ministers cannot enter the District of Columbia, so the channel has usually been held in the greater Washington area. 

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Randy Schriver, a former top Pentagon Asia official, told the FT that the special channel was important because of the “limited contacts allowed because of the unofficial relationship.” 

US-China relations plunged to a new low after the 2022 visit to Taiwan by the then-US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. China responded by holding major military exercises, including firing missiles near Taiwan, to protest Pelosi’s visit.

While the US officially recognizes Taiwan as part of China, it has supplied the island in recent years with weapons, ammunition and equipment to “deter” an “invasion” from the mainland. The US also maintains informal diplomatic and economic ties with Taipei, which is also a major source of semiconductors and chips for Western markets.

The US helped evacuate Chinese nationalist forces to Taiwan in 1949, after the Communists emerged victorious in the civil war. Washington only recognized the People’s Republic of China in 1979, treating the government in Taipei as the ‘Republic of China’ in the meantime.

Beijing’s official Taiwan policy is peaceful reintegration, though China has not ruled out using force in the event of the island declaring independence.