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After controversial phone call with Taiwan’s leader, Donald Trump was ‘urged to show restraint’
- White House adviser Michael Pillsbury says he was criticised for his suggestions by China hawks
- Trump ‘probably has closer relations with a Chinese leader than any other US president’
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Wendy Wuin Beijing
White House adviser Michael Pillsbury says even before Donald Trump took office, he carried a message to the US president-elect that China wanted him to show restraint in managing America’s relations with China – including no more phone calls with Taiwanese leader Tsai Ing-wen.
And Trump took the advice, as a way to build constructive ties with the country and a personal relationship with President Xi Jinping, Pillsbury said in an interview with the South China Morning Post.
Trump abandoned decades of protocol on December 2, 2016 – about a month before he took office – by taking a phone call from Tsai congratulating him on winning the presidency. It was the first such conversation between a US president or president-elect and a Taiwanese leader since 1979, when Washington switched formal diplomatic ties from Taipei to Beijing.
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After the controversial call, Trump said in a tweet: “Interesting how the US sells Taiwan billions of dollars of military equipment but I should not accept a congratulatory call.”
The call infuriated Beijing, which warned that the foundation of China-US relations would be jeopardised if the one-China policy was not respected.
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