Bloomberg: US plans to provide $10 billion to Taiwan

The US Congress is ready to provide Taiwan with military assistance in the amount of $10 billion. informs Reuters, citing a Bloomberg reporter’s Twitter post.

According to the agency, $10 billion in military aid will be used to bolster Taiwan’s defense capabilities amid “growing tensions and threats from China.”

Earlier, The Wall Street Journal, citing congressional and government sources wrotethat the US authorities fear that they will not be able to provide Taiwan with all the necessary weapons due to the fact that most of the military aid goes to Ukraine. The backlog of shipments to Taiwan, which topped $14 billion in December last year, has risen to $18.7 billion, according to congressional officials.

In early September, the US State Department announced plans to sell arms to Taiwan for $1.1 billion. Also in September, it became known that the US Senate Foreign Relations Committee approved bill to strengthen security ties with Taiwan. According to the document, Washington is going to provide Taipei with $ 4.5 billion, which the authorities of the island state will spend on weapons. The Chinese Foreign Ministry issued a strong protest against the bill.

That same month, US President Joe Biden declaredthat the US military would defend Taiwan if attacked by China, but emphasized that Washington continues to recognize the “one China” policy and the country’s territorial integrity, which considers Taiwan to be Chinese territory.

November 20 Chinese President Xi Jinping informed US President Joe Biden during the G20 summit in Bali that the Taiwan issue is “the core of China’s core interests and the first unbridgeable red line in Sino-US relations.”

Biden and Xi Jinping had a telephone conversation at the end of July. The main topic of conversation was Taiwan. Xi Jinping made it clear that the “one China” principle is still at the heart of relations between the two states, and “the more than 1.4 billion Chinese are determined to resolutely defend China’s national sovereignty and territorial integrity.”

In early August, then-Speaker of the US House of Representatives Nancy Pelosi arrived in Taiwan despite Chinese protests. According to the politician, in this way she decided to testify to the US support for democracy in Taiwan. On August 3, Pelosi left the island. August 15, Chinese Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Wang Wenbin declaredthat the visit of a delegation of US congressmen to Taiwan is contrary to the “one China” principle.

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