Donald Trump Taiwan leader call: China foreign minister hopes relations not damaged
Published 10:16 pm Friday, December 2, 2016
TAIPEI, Taiwan (AP) — The Latest on President-elect Donald Trump’s call to Taiwan’s leader (all times local):
12:10 p.m.
China’s foreign minister says he hopes Beijing’s relations with the U.S. won’t be “interfered with or damaged” after President-elect Donald Trump broke with decadeslong diplomatic tradition and spoke directly with Taiwan’s leader.
Hong Kong’s Phoenix TV reports that Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi said Saturday the call between Taiwan’s president and Trump was “just a small trick by Taiwan.” He said he thought it would not change longstanding U.S. policy toward China.
Wang says the so-called “one-China policy” is the cornerstone of U.S.-China relations and that Beijing hoped that foundation would not be “interfered with or damaged.”
It is highly unusual, probably unprecedented, for a U.S. president or president-elect to speak directly with a leader of Taiwan, a self-governing island the U.S. broke diplomatic ties with in 1979.