Pelosi Arrives in Taiwan, Voicing US ‘Solidarity’ as China Fumes

US House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi arrived in Taiwan late on Tuesday on a trip she said was intended to express American solidarity with the Chinese-claimed island, the first such visit in 25 years and one that risks pushing relations between Washington and Beijing to a new low.

Pelosi and her delegation disembarked from a US Air Force transport plan at Songshan Airport in downtown Taipei and were greeted by Taiwan's foreign minister, Joseph Wu and Sandra Oudkirk, the top US representative in Taiwan.

"Our congressional delegation's visit to Taiwan honors America's unwavering commitment to supporting Taiwan's vibrant democracy," Pelosi said in a statement shortly after landing. "America's solidarity with the 23 million people of Taiwan is more important today than ever, as the world faces a choice between autocracy and democracy."

China immediately condemned Pelosi's visit, with the foreign ministry saying it seriously damages peace and stability in the Taiwan Strait, "has a severe impact on the political foundation of China-US relations, and seriously infringes upon China's sovereignty and territorial integrity." The ministry said it had lodged a strong protest with the United States.

Chinese warplanes buzzed the line dividing the Taiwan Strait on Tuesday before her arrival, and Chinese state media said People's Liberation Army would hold exercises near Taiwan from Thursday through Sunday.

Pelosi, who is second in the line of succession to the US presidency and a long-time critic of Beijing, was on a tour of Asia that includes announced visits to Singapore, Malaysia, South Korea and Japan. Her stop in Taiwan had not been announced but had been widely anticipated.

In a Washington Post opinion piece released shortly after she landed, Pelosi outlined her reasons for visiting, praising Taiwan's commitment to democratic government while criticizing China as having dramatically increased tensions with Taiwan in recent years.

"We cannot stand by as the CCP proceeds to threaten Taiwan - and democracy itself," Pelosi said, referring to the Chinese Communist Party.

Pelosi also cited China's "brutal crackdown" against political dissent in Hong Kong, as well as its treatment of Muslim Uighurs and other minorities, which the United States has deemed genocide.

Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi said earlier on Tuesday that US politicians who "play with fire" on the Taiwan issue will "come to no good end".

White House national security spokesperson John Kirby said after Pelosi's arrival that the United States "is not going to be intimidated" by threats or bellicose rhetoric from China. Kirby said the visit is not a violation of either any sovereignty issues or America's longstanding "one-China policy."

"There's no reason for this visit to become a spurring event for a crisis or conflict," Kirby added.

Taiwan's presidential office said President Tsai Ing-wen will meet with Pelosi on Wednesday morning and would have lunch with her. Four sources said she was also scheduled on Wednesday afternoon to meet a group of activists who are outspoken about China's human rights record.

Pelosi, 82, is a close ally of US President Joe Biden, both being members of the Democratic Party, and has been a key figure in guiding his legislative agenda through the US Congress.

On Tuesday night, Taiwan's tallest building, Taipei 101, lit up with messages including: "Welcome to Taiwan", "Speaker Pelosi", "Taiwan (heart) USA".

With tensions already high, several Chinese warplanes flew close to the median line dividing the Taiwan Strait on Tuesday morning before leaving later in the day, a source told Reuters. Several Chinese warships have also sailed near the unofficial dividing line since Monday and remained there, the source said.

The Chinese aircraft repeatedly conducted tactical moves of briefly "touching" the median line and circling back to the other side of the strait while Taiwanese aircraft were on standby nearby, the person said.

Neither side's aircraft normally cross the median line.

Four US warships, including the aircraft carrier USS Ronald Reagan, were positioned in waters east of Taiwan on what the US Navy called routine deployments. The carrier had transited the South China Sea and was now in the Philippines Sea, east of Taiwan and the Philippines and south of Japan, a US Navy official told Reuters.

It was operating with the guided missile cruiser USS Antietam and destroyer USS Higgins, with the amphibious assault ship USS Tripoli also in the area.

Since last week, China's PLA has conducted various exercises, including live-fire drills, in the South China Sea, Yellow Sea and Bohai Sea, in a show of Chinese military might.

China views visits by US officials to Taiwan as sending an encouraging signal to the pro-independence camp on the democratic, self-governed island. Beijing considers Taiwan to be part of its territory and has never renounced using force to bring the island under its control. Taiwan rejects China's sovereignty claims and says only its people can decide the island's future.

The United States has no official diplomatic relations with Taiwan but is bound by American law to provide the island with the means to defend itself.

'State provocateur'

Russia - itself locked in confrontation with the West over its invasion of Ukraine - also chimed in on Pelosi's expected visit. Maria Zakharova, Russia's foreign ministry spokeswoman, said the visit was a provocative US attempt to pile pressure on China, a country with which Russia has forged a strong partnership in recent years.

"The USA is a state provocateur," Zakharova said. "Russia confirms the principle of 'one China' and opposes the independence of the island in any form."

Earlier on Tuesday, Pelosi visited Malaysia, having begun her Asia tour in Singapore on Monday. Her office said she would also go to South Korea and Japan but made no mention of a Taiwan visit.

Taiwan's Defense Ministry said it had a full grasp of military activities near Taiwan and that it would dispatch forces appropriately in reaction to "enemy threats".

China's defense and foreign ministries did not respond to requests for comment.

In the southeastern Chinese city of Xiamen, which lies opposite Taiwan and has a large military presence, residents reported sightings of armored vehicles.

During a phone call last Thursday, Chinese President Xi Jinping warned Biden that Washington should abide by the one-China principle and "those who play with fire will perish by it". Biden told Xi that US policy on Taiwan had not changed and that Washington strongly opposes unilateral efforts to change the status quo or undermine peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait.

Bonnie Glaser, a Taiwan expert at the German Marshall Fund of the United States, told reporters in a call that the damage to American-Chinese relations done by the Pelosi visit would be hard to repair.

"We all know how bad this relationship has been in the past year. And I just think that this visit by Nancy Pelosi is just going to take it to a new low," Glaser said. "And I think that it's going to be very difficult to recover from that."

NATO and Ukraine will hold emergency talks Tuesday after Russia attacked a central city with an experimental, hypersonic ballistic missile that escalated the nearly 33-month-old war.

The conflict is “entering a decisive phase,” Poland's Prime Minister Donald Tusk said Friday, and “taking on very dramatic dimensions.”

Ukraine’s parliament canceled a session as security was tightened following Thursday's Russian strike on a military facility in the city of Dnipro.

In a stark warning to the West, President Vladimir Putin said in a nationally televised speech to his nation that the attack with the intermediate-range Oreshnik missile was retaliation for Kyiv’s use of US and British longer-range missiles capable of striking deeper into Russian territory.

Putin said Western air defense systems would be powerless to stop the new missile.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov kept up Russia's bellicose tone on Friday, blaming “the reckless decisions and actions of Western countries” in supplying weapons to Ukraine to strike Russia.

"The Russian side has clearly demonstrated its capabilities, and the contours of further retaliatory actions in the event that our concerns were not taken into account have also been quite clearly outlined," he said.

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban, widely seen as having the warmest relations with the Kremlin in the European Union, echoed Moscow's talking points, suggesting the use of US-supplied weapons in Ukraine likely requires direct American involvement.

“These are rockets that are fired and then guided to a target via an electronic system, which requires the world’s most advanced technology and satellite communications capability,” Orban said on state radio. “There is a strong assumption ... that these missiles cannot be guided without the assistance of American personnel.”

Orban cautioned against underestimating Russia’s responses, emphasizing that the country’s recent modifications to its nuclear deployment doctrine should not be dismissed as a “bluff.” “It’s not a trick... there will be consequences,” he said.

Separately in Kyiv, Czech Foreign Minister Jan Lipavský called Thursday's missile strike an “escalatory step and an attempt of the Russian dictator to scare the population of Ukraine and to scare the population of Europe.”

At a news conference with Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha, Lipavský also expressed his full support for delivering the necessary additional air defense systems to protect Ukrainian civilians from the “heinous attacks.”

He underlined that the Czech Republic will impose no limits on the use of its weapons and equipment given to Ukraine.

Three lawmakers from Ukraine's parliament, the Verkhovna Rada, confirmed that Friday's previously scheduled session was called off due to the ongoing threat of Russian missiles targeting government buildings in central Kyiv.

In addition, there also was a recommendation to limit the work of all commercial offices and nongovernmental organizations "in that perimeter, and local residents were warned of the increased threat,” said lawmaker Mykyta Poturaiev, who added this is not the first time such a threat has been received.

President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s office continued to work in compliance with standard security measures, a spokesperson said.

Ukraine’s Main Intelligence Directorate said the Oreshnik missile, whose name in Russian means “hazelnut tree,” was fired from the Kapustin Yar 4th Missile Test Range in Russia’s Astrakhan region, and flew 15 minutes before striking Dnipro. The missile had six nonnuclear warheads each carrying six submunitions and reached a spoeed of Mach 11, it said.

Test launches of a similar missile were conducted in October 2023 and June 2024, the directorate said. The Pentagon confirmed the missile was a new, experimental type of intermediate-range missile based on its RS-26 Rubezh intercontinental ballistic missile.

Thursday's attack struck the Pivdenmash plant that built ICBMs when Ukraine was part of the Soviet Union. The military facility is located about 4 miles (6 1/2 kilometers) southwest of the center of Dnipro, a city of about 1 million that is Ukraine’s fourth-largest and a key hub for military supplies and humanitarian aid, and is home to one of the country’s largest hospitals for treating wounded soldiers from the front before their transfer to Kyiv or abroad.

The stricken area was cordoned off and out of public view. With no fatalities reported from the attack, Dnipro residents resorted to dark humor on social media, mostly focused on the missile’s name, Oreshnik.

Elsewhere in Ukraine, Russia struck a residential district of Sumy overnight with Iranian-designed Shahed drones, killing two people and injuring 13, the regional administration said..

Ukraine’s Suspilne media, quoting Sumy regional head Volodymyr Artiukh, said the drones were stuffed with shrapnel elements. “These weapons are used to destroy people, not to destroy objects,” said Artiukh, according to Suspilne.

Pelosi Arrives in Taiwan, Voicing US ‘Solidarity’ as China Fumes