The American Institute in Taiwan (AIT) has registered its “disappointment” over a New Year’s Day flag-raising ceremony held at the Taiwan-owned Twin Oaks Estate in Washington DC. The AIT is the de facto US embassy in Taiwan in the absense of official diplomatic ties between the two sides.
AIT Spokesman Mark Zimmer said Thursday that the US government hopes that a similar incident will not happen again. The flag raising ceremony was the first of its kind since the US broke off diplomatic relations with Taiwan in favor of Beijing in 1979.
The ceremony has caused irritation in China, which regards Taiwan as part of its territory. It also caused concern in the US, which maintains unofficial relations with Taiwan but has no wish to provoke China.
Meanwhile, US State Department spokesperson Jen Psaki said at a press conference on Wednesday that the flag-raising ceremony violated US expectations of conduct. Psaki said that US officials are communicating with their Taiwanese counterparts about the flag-raising ceremony. She declined to speculate about any repercussions the ceremony might have on US-Taiwan relations, saying only that the US and Taiwan have important cultural ties that should be maintained.