China blasts ex-Australian PM Tony Abbott’s ‘highly irresponsible’ Taiwan remarks

Name: Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen says island 'will not bow' to mainland China
Uploaded: 2021-10-11T12:00:45.000Z
Duration: 2 min 23 s
Description: Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen says island 'will not bow' to mainland China

Foreign ministry spokesman says he ‘wantonly interfered with China’s internal affairs and smeared China’

Abbott had taken aim at Beijing’s ‘growing belligerence’ towards the self-ruled island and called for international support

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Former Australian prime minister Tony Abbott speaks during a meeting with Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen on Thursday. His visit to the self-ruled island has angered Beijing. Photo: Reuters

Catherine Wong

Published: 8:00pm, 11 Oct 2021Updated: 8:00pm, 11 Oct 2021

China has called former Australian prime minister Tony Abbott’s remarks “highly irresponsible” after he warned that Beijing could “lash out disastrously” at Taiwan very soon.

Abbott’s trip – made as a private citizen – has angered Beijing, which claims the self-ruled island as its own territory. The former prime minister met President Tsai Ing-wen during the visit, and in a speech at a security forum in Taipei on Friday he took aim at Beijing’s “growing belligerence” towards Taiwan and called for international support for the island.

Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian on Monday said Beijing had lodged a solemn representation with Australia over the remarks.

“The relevant politician has … wantonly interfered with China’s internal affairs and smeared China, which is highly immoral and highly irresponsible, and sure to be unpopular,” Zhao said during a regular briefing.

He also called on Australian politicians to “abandon their Cold War mentality and ideological prejudice, respect the facts, rationally view China and China’s rise, and stop issuing irresponsible remarks”.

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

Abbott’s visit comes at a tense time for relations between Australia and China. It also comes amid soaring tensions across the Taiwan Strait after Beijing sent a record number of warplanes into the island’s air defence identification zone in recent days. Beijing has not ruled out the use of force to bring Taiwan under its control.