On Saturday, the island nation of Taiwan elected William Lai, also known as Lai Ching-te, as the new president – sparking concern that China could take this as a good reason to invade.
Current vice-president Lai has been branded a ‘troublemaker’ and a dangerous ‘sepraratist’ by Beijing. His election victory is a big concern for President Xi Jinping, as it is no secret that his ultimate goal is unification of the two states.
Beijing has ramped up threats in the past year, and has renewed warnings against electing the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) – but Taiwanese ignored the calls and elected them anyway for a third term.
On the campaign trail, Lai declared: “There is no need to declare independence, because Taiwan is already an independent sovereign state – its name is the Republic of China – Taiwan.”
China has had no formal communication with Taiwan since 2016, and the mainland seems extremely unlikely to agree to any dialogue with the new president.
There is already a very tense situation in the South China Sea, between the two nations, as Chinese military aircraft and ships cross into Taiwanese territory almost daily.
Following the election result, there are fears China could ramp up these incursions with a show of military force, or try to lure away more of the handful of states that still recognise Taiwan as an independent state and putting more sanctions on companies.
After the historic election result on Saturday, we are asking Express.co.uk readers if they are concerned Xi Jinping will attack Taiwan.
Let us know your thoughts in the poll below.
DPP won by a large margain against rivals Kuomintang (KMT), which ran a campaign warning that China could attack the island.
Analysts suggest that had KMT won, Xi Jinping may have backed off and would have been open to dialogue with the island nation. However, this result means the future of Taiwan’s independence remains up in the air.
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