Why The US Is Deliberately Provoking China: Jeffrey Sachs | Climax
- Washington raises Taiwan stakes
by https://www.rt.com/
The US Senate proposal would give Taipei $4.5 billion in weapons and back membership in international bodies
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A bill that would commit $4.5 billion in US weapons for the defense of Taiwan and promote Taipei’s membership in international organizations, among other things, cleared the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on Wednesday in a 17-5 vote. The Taiwan Policy Act comes after weeks of escalating tensions between Washington and Beijing that started with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan.
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The bill aims to “reinforce US policy towards Taiwan in order to maintain stable cross-Strait deterrence,” Senator Bob Menendez, the New Jersey Democrat who chairs the committee, said, accusing China of a “campaign to undermine the status quo.”
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“The most comprehensive revamp of US-Taiwan policy in more than four decades,” as Politico described it, would authorize $4.5 billion in “direct military assistance” to Taipei and “bolster Taiwan’s sovereignty” by encouraging its membership in international organizations. Menendez and its cosponsor, South Carolina’s Lindsey Graham, insisted this does not go against the official US policy of ‘One China.’
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Menendez rejected the arguments that the bill would stoke tensions with Beijing, saying that it is instead “carefully and strategically lowering the existential threats facing Taiwan by raising the cost of taking the island by force so that it becomes too high a risk and unachievable.”
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