From left, Japanese Overseas Minister Iwaya Takeshi, Canadian Overseas Minister Melanie Joly, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio, German Overseas Minister Annalena Baerbock, Italian Overseas Minister Antonio Tajani and EU overseas coverage chief Kaja Kallas attend the G7 overseas ministers assembly in La Malbaie, Canada, Friday March 14, 2025. (Saul Loeb, Pool Picture by way of AP)
TAIPEI, Taiwan – China has lashed out at accusations it’s endangering maritime security made by high diplomats from the Group of seven industrialized democracies in a joint assertion, saying the G7 members are “full of conceitedness, prejudice and malicious intentions.”
Even for China’s usually overheated diplomatic language, the assertion issued Saturday was unusually vitriolic, though it didn’t threaten any retaliation.
Within the Friday assertion that sparked the Chinese language response, the G7 stated, “We condemn China’s illicit, provocative, coercive and harmful actions that search unilaterally to change the established order in such a manner as to danger undermining the soundness of areas, together with by way of land reclaimations, and constructing of outposts, in addition to their use for navy goal.”
“We reaffirm that our primary insurance policies on Taiwan stay unchanged and emphasize the significance of peace and stability throughout the Taiwan Strait as indispensable to worldwide safety and prosperity,” the assertion stated, referring to the essential waterway separating China from the self-governing island republic it claims as its personal territory.
Within the response issued by way of its embassy in Canada, the place the two-day G7 assembly was held in La Malbaie, Quebec, China stated the assertion “repeated the identical outdated rhetoric, ignored details and China’s solemn place, grossly interfered in China’s inside affairs, and blatantly smeared China.”
“The statements are full of conceitedness, prejudice and malicious intentions to suppress and assault China. China strongly deplores and opposes this and has lodged solemn representations with the Canadian facet,” the assertion stated.
China claims nearly all the South China Sea, by way of which passes round $5 trillion in international commerce.
It has dismissed and sometimes clashed with different nations that declare components of the ocean, particularly the Philippines, a U.S. treaty companion.
China shouldn’t be a member of the G7 however intently follows all feedback and references to its worldwide standing made by worldwide organizations or in overseas nations, responding to criticism with caustic language.
China has firmly rejected a U.N.-affiliated court docket’s ruling that invalidated most of its claims to the South China Sea and says its declare to Taiwan is non-negotiable, even when China has to make use of drive towards the island.
China routinely sends ships and warplanes into airspace and waters close to Taiwan, constructed navy bases on human-made islands within the South China Sea and lately staged shock live-fire workout routines within the Tasman Sea between Australia and New Zealand for which it gave no advance discover.
Australia’s aviation authority stated it discovered of the drills simply half-hour earlier than they started, not from Beijing however from a pilot flying within the space, and 49 industrial flights had been pressured to change their flight paths in response.
The G7 didn’t point out the drills in its assertion.
“We share a rising concern at current, unjustifiable efforts to limit such freedom and to broaden jurisdiction by way of use of drive and different types of coercion, together with throughout the Taiwan Strait, and within the South China Sea, the Purple Sea, and the Black Sea,” the G7 stated.
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China has the world’s largest navy, together with three plane carriers, with a fourth on the best way. It has a base in Sheikhdom of Djibouti within the Horn of Africa and persistently has expanded the vary of the drive.
