TAIPEI, Taiwan (AP) – Taiwan President Tsai Ing-wen met with a delegation of members of the U.S. Congress on Monday in a further show of support among U.S. lawmakers on the self-ruled island than the China claims it as its own territory.
Taiwanese media showed the delegation arriving for the talks, but details of the meeting were not immediately released.
It comes less than two weeks after US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan sparked days of threatening military exercises by China, including firing missiles over the island and the Taiwan Strait.
China has also sent warplanes and navy ships through the middle of the waterway, which has long been a buffer between the sides that split amid civil war in 1949. China considers formal contacts between American politicians and the island’s government as a support for its independence from Beijing.
China says it wants to use peaceful means to bring Taiwan under its control, but its recent sabre-rattling has emphasized its military threat.
The five-member delegation is headed by Democratic Senator Ed Markey of Massachusetts and will meet with other government and private sector representatives. Easing tensions across the Taiwan Strait and investments in Taiwan’s crucial semiconductor industry are expected to be key topics of discussion.
The remaining members of the delegation are Republican Rep. Aumua Amata Coleman Radewagen, delegate of American Samoa, and Democrats John Garamendi and Alan Lowenthal of California and Don Beyer of Virginia.