US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi departed Taiwan on Wednesday, a tour that fueled US-China rift. Pelosi’s visit, a first by the highest-ranking elected US official in more than 25 years, was viewed as an offence by Beijing as she is being seen as third in line for the presidency in the US after Joe Biden and vice-president Kamala Harris. Depsite several hostile threats by China before Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan, the US House Speaker landed in Taipei on Tuesday night.
The US House Speaker is on a tour of four Asian nations — Singapore, Malayasia, South Korea, and Japan — while a visit to Taiwan, a territory which China says to be its own, was not included in her official schedule. Pelosi’s next stop is South Korea.