Taiwan warns citizens against traveling to China

Last Updated on June 29, 2024 8:41 am

The Taiwan government has issued a travel warning for citizens to China. The country has advised its citizens not to travel to China unless necessary. Taiwan issued the warning on Thursday after China threatened to impose the death penalty on Taiwanese independence activists last week. This information was revealed in the report of Times of India on Friday.

Taiwan Mainland Welfare Council spokesman Liang Wen-chieh told reporters the issued travel warning also applies to the Chinese-administered cities of Hong Kong and Macau. China considers the democratically governed Taiwan as its own territory. The country claims that Taiwan is a province that has left China. Which will be connected again with China. Beijing views the territory’s president Lai Ching as a ‘separatist’.

China has made no secret of its dislike of the Taiwanese president since he took office. Even after he took office last month, the Chinese military conducted 2-day war drills around Taiwan. Meanwhile, China issued a statement last week threatening Taiwan’s independence separatists in extreme cases.

China said Friday’s directive would punish those who incite Taiwan’s independence movement with the death penalty. Apart from this, the directive also mentions imprisonment from 10 years to life imprisonment. President Lai and his government, as well as the United States, condemned China’s threat, raising tensions.

As a result, Liang announced the warning about travel to China at a regular press conference in Taipei on Thursday. In it, he said, these instructions represent a serious threat to the safety of Taiwanese visiting China. He also said, if there is no need to go, then don’t go. It is not a travel ban. But the directive reminded Taiwanese people of their risks rather than protections and countermeasures. China’s Taiwan Affairs Office did not immediately respond to a request for comment, Reuters said.