TAIPEI (Reuters) – A trip to the United States by the head of Taiwan’s China-policy making Mainland Affairs Council has been delayed due to important domestic matters he has to handle, his office said on Wednesday.
The Mainland Affairs Council said its minister Chiu Tai-san’s Sept. 6’s Brookings Institution think-tank event would be postponed, but an event the next day it has co-organised with the Center for a New American Security would take place as scheduled.
Chiu’s visit will be happening amid heightened tensions with China, which has been staging war games and military exercises near Taiwan since the start of this month responding to the Taipei trip of U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.
China which claims Taiwan as its own territory against the strong objections of the democratically elected government in Taipei.
The Mainland Affairs Council said the postponement of the trip, where he was also due to meet U.S. officials, was due to him having to handle “important domestic affairs”, though gave no details.
(Reporting by Ben Blanchard; Editing by Kim Coghill)
