Obama authorises Taiwan arms sale

The White House said there clearly was no change in the longstanding USA “one China” policy. The proposed sale also includes Phalanx Close-in Weapons System guns, upgrade kits, ammunition and support.

It would be the first arms sale to Taiwan since 2011.

Congress has 30 days to review the sale, but it’s unlikely to raise objections.

Past U.S. weapons sales to Taiwan have attracted strong condemnation in China, which considers Taiwan a renegade province.

“I remain deeply concerned about the administration’s delays that needlessly dragged out this process”, said Rep. Ed Royce, chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee.

Xinhua said Zheng described the US sales authorization announced on Wednesday as going against worldwide law and basic norms of global relations and said that they “severely” harmed China’s sovereignty and security. While the deal is small in comparison to the multibillion dollar agreements recently signed by Saudi Arabia, Iraq and other Middle Eastern countries, it comes with big implications for the relationship between Washington, D.C., and Beijing.

“This is something we’ve done through successive administrations and we’ve had an unending support for Taiwan being able to maintain its defensive capability”, Davis said.

“It also highlights the fact that U.S.-Taiwan relations are indeed at their best ever”, the statement said.

Taiwan, however, has weighed less on the U.S.-China relationship, as tensions between Taiwan and the mainland have eased in recent years, notwithstanding the growing gap in military capabilities across the Taiwan Strait.

The US said the deal was consistent with its “long-standing policy on arms sales to Taiwan”.

State department spokesman John Kirby said the sale was consistent with the 1979 Taiwan Relations Act, which requires the U.S. to provide Taiwan with sufficient weaponry to defend itself, even though the USA does not recognise Taiwan as a state independent of China. Beijing suspended some military exchanges with the United States, but did not seriously impair ties.

Pentagon spokesman Bill Urban said “US and Chinese counterparts have been in contact today”, both on the military and political level, but declined to go into more details and referred reporters to Chinese officials for comment.

Relations have undergone a steady improvement over the past two decades, especially under the Beijing-friendly administration of Taiwanese President Ma Ying- jeou.