The Taiwanese official added that he is expected to stay in Taiwan overnight. It’s unclear exactly when Pelosi will land in Taipei.
Pelosi arrived in Singapore on Monday for the first official stop of the tour in Asia, where she met with the president, prime minister and other top officials of the country.
On Tuesday, Malaysian state media Bernama confirmed that Pelosi and a congressional delegation had arrived in the country and planned to meet with the prime minister and speaker of parliament.
The delegation’s itinerary includes stops in South Korea and Japan, but no official mention has been made of the visit to Taiwan.
During a regular foreign ministry briefing on Monday, China warned against the “glaring political impact” of Pelosi’s planned visit to the autonomous island that China claims as part of its territory and reiterated that its military “will not stand idly by” if Beijing considers that its “sovereignty and territorial integrity” are being threatened.
“We would like to tell the US again that China is standing by and that the Chinese People’s Liberation Army will never stand idly by. China will take decisive responses and forceful countermeasures to defend its sovereignty and territorial integrity,” he said Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian. he told reporters when asked about the fallout from Pelosi leading a congressional delegation in Taipei.
“As for what measures, if he dares to go there, let’s wait and see,” Zhao added.
While China’s military did not mention Taiwan, the People’s Liberation Army’s Eastern Theater Command said it would “bury incoming enemies” in a video posted online Monday showing its weapons and fighting tactics. “It is firmly prepared and ready for combat command; bury all incoming enemies,” said a message posted on Weibo.
Secretary of State Antony Blinken reiterated the administration’s line that it is Pelosi’s decision if she visits, adding, “we don’t know what Speaker Pelosi intends to do.”
“Congress is an independent and equal branch of government,” Blinken told the United Nations on Monday afternoon. “The decision is entirely the President’s.”
Blinken said this visit is unprecedented, noting that past speakers and members of Congress have visited Taiwan.
“And so if the speaker decides to visit and China tries to create some kind of crisis or escalate tensions, that would be entirely on Beijing,” Blinken said. “We are looking for them, in the event that she decides to visit them, to act responsibly and not commit to any escalation in the future.”
National Security Council strategic communications coordinator John Kirby said Monday that the Biden administration will support Pelosi on a trip to Taiwan.
“We want to make sure that when he travels abroad, he can do so safely and we will make sure of that. There is no reason for Chinese rhetoric. There is no reason to take any action. It is not strange that congressional leaders are traveling to Taiwan,” Kirby told CNN’s Brianna Keilar on “New Day.”
“We should not be as a country, we should not be intimidated by that rhetoric or those potential actions. This is an important journey for the speaker and we will do everything we can to support him,” Kirby continued. .
Asked if the United States was prepared for fallout with China during the visit, Kirby said “there is no change in our policy. There is no change in our approach to trying to keep an Indo – Free, safe and open Pacific.”
The issue of Taiwan remains one of the most controversial. President Joe Biden and his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping discussed it at length in a two-hour, 17-minute phone call Thursday as tensions rose between Washington and Beijing.
“The Taiwan issue is the most sensitive and important core issue in China-US relations,” Chinese Ambassador to the US Qin Gang told the Aspen Security Forum in July.
While Biden has said publicly that the U.S. military didn’t think it was a good time for Pelosi to visit Taiwan, he stopped short of directly telling her not to go, according to two sources.
Administration officials have worked in recent weeks to brief the House speaker on the risks of visiting the democratic, self-governing island of 24 million residents, including at briefings by the Pentagon and other administration officials . But Biden didn’t think it was his place to tell him he shouldn’t go, and has avoided commenting publicly about his trip since his initial statement on July 21.
Biden said last month that the US military opposed Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan, although he has since declined to elaborate on the warnings. The White House has said it depends on the speaker of the House where he travels.
Still, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin recently said he had discussed a visit to Asia with Pelosi.
The administration is very careful about Pelosi’s safety when she travels abroad because she is in the line of presidential succession.
Administration officials are concerned that Pelosi’s trip comes at a particularly tense time, as Xi is expected to seek an unprecedented third term at the upcoming Chinese Communist Party congress. Chinese party officials are expected to begin laying the groundwork for that conference in the coming weeks, pressuring the leadership in Beijing to show strength.
Officials also believe that the Chinese leadership does not fully understand the political dynamics in the United States, leading to a misunderstanding of the significance of Pelosi’s possible visit. Officials say China may be mistaking Pelosi’s visit for an official administration visit since she and Biden are both Democrats. Administration officials are concerned that China won’t separate Pelosi from Biden much, if at all.
Pelosi has long been a critic of the Chinese Communist Party. He has met with pro-democracy dissidents and the Dalai Lama, the exiled Tibetan spiritual leader who remains a thorn in the side of the Chinese government. In 1991, Pelosi unfurled a black-and-white banner in Beijing’s Tiananmen Square to commemorate the victims of the 1989 massacre, which read, “To those who died for democracy.” In recent years, he supported pro-democracy protests in Hong Kong.
The Chinese embassy in the United States has objected to his expected trip, which was planned for April before Pelosi tested positive for Covid-19, and has urged members of Congress to tell the speaker that don’t do it
“I would say there’s been a full press from the Chinese embassy to discourage a trip to Taiwan,” Rep. Rick Larsen, D-Washington, co-chairman of the US-China Congressional Task Force, told CNN. “I don’t think it’s their business to tell us what we should do. That was my message.”
Liu Pengyu, a spokesman for the Chinese embassy in the US, responded that his office is in “regular contact” with members of Congress, including Larsen.
“On the Taiwan issue, we have made our position strong and clear,” Pengyu said. “The embassy is making every effort to prevent peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait and the stability of China-US relations from being damaged by the president’s possible visit of the House, Nancy Pelosi, in Taiwan.”
“We hope that serious consequences can be avoided,” he added. “This is in the common interest of both China and the US.”
Many Democrats and Republicans in Congress said it was Pelosi’s right to travel to Taiwan.
“It’s Speaker Pelosi’s sole decision whether or not to travel to Taiwan, not to any other country,” said Rep. Darin LaHood, Republican of Illinois, Larsen’s Republican counterpart on the US-China task force. “In our democratic system, we operate with separate but equal branches of government.”
“It is inappropriate for foreign governments, including the Chinese government, to attempt to influence the ability or right to travel for the Speaker, members of Congress, or other US government officials to Taiwan or anywhere else in the world. “, added.
Other members appeared to be more cautious about the diplomatically sensitive trip.
California Democratic Rep. Judy Chu, the first Chinese American woman elected to Congress, said she has “always supported Taiwan.”
But when asked if a trip to Taiwan now would send the wrong message, Chu said: “You could look at it two ways. One is that relations are very strained right now. But on the other hand, you could say which may be when Taiwan. We also need to show strength and support.”
Asked what he thought, he said: “I’ll leave that to those who will make that decision.”
This story was updated Monday with additional details.
CNN’s Jennifer Hansler, Nectar Gan, Yong Xiong, Hannah Ritchie, Chandelis Duster and Betsy Klein contributed to this report.