Taiwan is a "wanderer" that will eventually come home and not a chess piece to be played with, the Chinese government's top diplomat said Monday, reaffirming Beijing's determination to bring the island under its control.
China claims democratically governed Taiwan as its own territory, and has in the past two years stepped up military and diplomatic pressure to assert its sovereignty claims, to anger in Taipei and deep concern in Washington.
Speaking in Beijing, State Councillor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi said the cause of current tensions was the Taiwan government's attempts to "rely on the United States for independence" and the United States and other countries trying to "use Taiwan to control China."