US, Japan, South Korea Foreign Ministers Emphasize Importance of Taiwan Strait Peace, Express Concern Over Taiwan's Surroundings

(CNA Washington, July 8) Amid escalating Chinese gray-zone incursions into Taiwan, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio met with Japanese Foreign Minister Toshimitsu Motegi and South Korean Foreign Minister Cho Hyun-ah on the sidelines of the NATO summit in Turkey yesterday. The State Department announced today that the three emphasized the importance of maintaining peace and stability in the Taiwan Strait and expressed concern over increasingly frequent and destabilizing actions around Taiwan.

The State Department issued a press release stating that Rubio met with Motegi and Cho on the sidelines of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) summit in Ankara, Turkey, yesterday to emphasize how deepening trilateral cooperation can benefit common economic well-being and promote security and prosperity in a free and open Indo-Pacific region.

The State Department noted that the three also stressed the importance of NATO and Indo-Pacific partners cooperating on issues of common concern, including accelerating defense spending and production, energy, combating cyber and hybrid attacks, and sharing information on security developments and challenges in the broader Euro-Atlantic and Indo-Pacific regions.

Concurrently, they reiterated their opposition to economic coercion and the weaponization of supply chains for political purposes, and pledged to uphold freedom of navigation through trilateral cooperation.

Regarding the Taiwan Strait issue, the State Department stated that Rubio and the foreign ministers of Japan and South Korea emphasized the importance of maintaining peace and stability in the Taiwan Strait and expressed concern over increasingly frequent and destabilizing actions around Taiwan. "They also encouraged the peaceful resolution of cross-strait issues and opposed any attempt to unilaterally change the status quo, particularly by force or coercion."

President Lai Ching-te recently stated that China has continuously engaged in gray-zone incursions and maritime coercion against neighboring countries in recent years. Recent maritime actions in the East China Sea, South China Sea, and waters around the Taiwan Strait, under the guise of law enforcement or patrols, are essentially using law enforcement as a pretext to pursue expansion. (Editor: Yang Chao-yen) 111111111111111115-Yang Chao-yen) 0708

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