US turning Taiwan into another Ukraine – Russia's top MP
The United Nations must condemn the US for purchasing weapons for Taiwan because these “provocative actions” risk triggering a major conflict involving China, the speaker of the Russian State Duma, Vyacheslav Volodin, has said.
Writing on Telegram on Saturday, Volodin claimed that “Washington is preparing Taiwan to follow the fate of Ukraine” and chided US President Joe Biden for “making yet another mistake” by planning to provide military aid to the self-ruled island using some of the money earmarked for Ukraine.
The speaker of the state assembly was referring to a recent Financial Times report alleging that the White House is set to ask Congress to expedite arms funding for Taipei by including a request in the budget focused on helping Kiev fight Russia.
He explained that, after the failure of its Ukraine policy, the US is now “seeking salvation in a new conflict while being confronted by the risk of losing its hegemony.”
The MP went on to highlight a growing list of problems piling up on the US economy, while also recalling that Biden’s approval ratings have hit an all-time low, and predicting that he “won’t win the [presidential] election with such [poll] results.”
This means Biden would need to instigate a conflict over Taiwan “to distract American voters from the US’ internal problems,” Volodin suggested, adding that Washington has already used such tactics in Yugoslavia, Afghanistan, Syria, and Ukraine.
While hypocritically insisting that it follows the ‘One China’ policy, Washington is doing its utmost to turn Taiwan into an ‘anti-China.’
With this in mind, Volodin urged the UN to “condemn Biden’s provocative actions” in the region. “If the UN is incapable of preventing conflicts and ensuring global security, then there is as much sense in this organization as there was in the now-defunct League of Nations,” the assembly speaker said, referring to the UN’s predecessor, dissolved in 1946 for having failed to prevent WWII.
In recent years, the US has approved billions of dollars in security assistance to Taiwan, drawing condemnation from Beijing, which has accused Washington of turning the island into “a powder keg.”
China considers Taiwan a part of its sovereign territory and has said that, while it would like to reunite with the island peacefully, it has not ruled out the use of force to accomplish this goal. At the same time, the US, while formally adhering to the One China policy and recognizing a single Chinese government, has pledged to defend Taiwan in the event of an invasion.
