China has not changed its policy of peaceful reunification with Taiwan despite US arms sales to Taiwan and apparent adjustments by Washington to its long-standing Taiwan policy of "strategic ambiguity," Chinese officials said Sunday.
"The Chinese government's fundamental policy of 'peaceful reunification, one country-two systems' on resolving the Taiwan issue has not changed," a foreign ministry spokesman said.
"In order to avoid further damage to Sino-US relations, the US side should ... stop selling arms to Taiwan and stop using the Taiwan issue to interfere in China's internal affairs," the spokesman said.
The spokesman was commenting on remarks made late Friday in Washington by US Vice President Dick Cheney in which he reiterated US intentions to "do whatever it took" to defend Taiwan amid a mainland missile build up on its southeastern coast facing Taiwan.
President George W. Bush earlier made the pledge to defend Taiwan following his decision Tuesday to sell Taiwan a five-billion-dollar package of sophisticated weapons.
The sale announcement came despite vehement opposition from Beijing which accused Washington of interference in its internal affairs and warned that Bush had taken a step down a "dangerous road."
Cheney, in the Friday interview with CNN, also indicated that the US was prepared to shelve its decades old policy of "strategic" or "diplomatic ambiguity" on Taiwan, in which the US has refused to say under what circumstance or to what extent it was willing to go to defend the rebel territory.
"People talk about diplomatic ambiguity, and of course, there has been some ambiguity there over the years," Cheney said.
"But in this particular case, especially given what appears to be a somewhat more threatening posture of the mainland toward Taiwan over the last few months, ambiguity may be exactly the wrong thing to do."
China has called the US allegations of a missile build up facing Taiwan "groundless," while reiterating its right as a sovereign nation to develop its defense policy as it sees fit.
Beijing considers Taiwan part of its territory despite Taiwan's de facto independence since 1949 and has urged reunificiation through the "one country, two systems" formula that saw the 1997 return of Hong Kong and the 1999 return of Macao to Chinese sovereignty.
Despite its basic hope for peaceful reunification, Beijing has also refused to renounce the use of force in any eventual reunification.
Meanwhile, the spokesman also urged Washington to appropriately resolve the testy April 1 incident in which a Chinese fighter jet collided with a US spy plane over the South China Seas.
The collision resulted in the loss of the Chinese pilot, while the US plane emergency landed on a Chinese military base where it remains in Chinese custody. China released the crew after 11-days in detention.
On Sunday, Xinhua news agency announced that the US side would be allowed to inspect the spy plane after several rounds of consultations between the two sides in an effort to resolve the row.
"Having completed its investigation and evidence collection involving the US plane and in view of international precedents in handling such issues, the Chinese side has decided to allow the US side to inspect its plane at Lingshui Airport," Xinhua said.
The US has expressed sorrow over the incident and over the loss of the Chinese pilot, while Beijing has demanded the end of US surveillance flights near its coast and blamed the entire incident on the US.
Washington has blamed the incident on reckless flying by the Chinese pilot and demand the prompt return of the plane crammed full of high-tech surveillance equipment.
Xinhua said that the US agreed to consider a "payment to the Chinese side," with another round of negotiations on the specific amount to be held.
It was not clear if the payment would be for repairs of the plane or costs in housing the crew on Chinese territory, or as the compensation for the loss of the Chinese fighter jet and pilot that the Chinese side has demanded – BEIJING (AFP)
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