EU reiterates support for Lithuania in row with China over Taiwan

Name: Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen says island 'will not bow' to mainland China
Uploaded: 2021-10-19T21:22:19.000Z
Duration: 2 min 23 s
Description: Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen says island 'will not bow' to mainland China

European Commission Executive Vice-President Margrethe Vestager expresses ‘solidarity’ and ‘support’ for Vilnius

European Parliament debates its first position paper exclusively on Taiwan

Reading Time:4 minutes

Why you can trust SCMP

European Commission’s Executive Vice-President Margrethe Vestager delivers a speech during a debate on EU-Taiwan political relations and cooperation at the European Parliament in Strasbourg, France on Tuesday. Photo: EPA-EFE

Finbarr Bermingham

Published: 5:22am, 20 Oct 2021Updated: 10:27pm, 20 Oct 2021

As European lawmakers demanded the EU foster closer ties with Taiwan, a leading Brussels official vowed to push back against China’s “attempts to intimidate” Lithuania and other member states over their relations with the self-ruled island.

Beijing moved to stop Chinese freight trains from travelling to Lithuania in August, after the tiny Baltic nation moved forward with plans to host a “Taiwanese Representative Office” in its capital city Vilnius.

Lithuanian businesses have also reported losses of export licences in some sectors, in what its government has decried as economic bullying on the part of the world’s second largest economy.

European Commission Executive Vice-President Margrethe Vestager, speaking on behalf of the bloc’s top diplomat, Josep Borrell, expressed “solidarity” and “support” for Vilnius.

02:23

Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen says island 'will not bow' to mainland China

“Lithuania and all member states [who] find themselves coerced for taking decisions that China finds offensive need support and our solidarity. The EU will continue to push back at these attempts and adopt appropriate tools, such as the anti-coercion instrument, currently under preparation,” said Vestager, also the EU’s competition commissioner, in an address to the European Parliament in Strasbourg, France on Tuesday.

Select Voice

Choose your listening speed

Get through articles 2x faster

1.25x

250 WPM

Slow

Average

Fast

00:0000:00

1.25x