Mike Pompeo has blasted Emmanuel Macron over his claims that Europe should stay out of the row with China over Taiwan.
Trump’s secretary of state criticized the French leader’s claims that the European Union should not take sides in the long-running dispute over who controls the island.
“The best way to respond to China’s provocations is to recognize Taiwan as a free and sovereign state,” said the former CIA director. “Never give an inch.”
Pompeo, who served as the 70th Secretary of State of the United States from 2018 to 2021, is rumored to be considering a run for the White House.
In a veiled criticism of the French president, former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said the only correct response to Chinese aggression was to recognize Taiwan as an independent country.
His comments came after Macron’s much-criticised interview with several French media outlets in which he suggested Europe not get involved in the row.
“We do not want to delve into the logic of bloc against bloc,” Macron said in an interview with the French business daily Les Echo, indicating that Europe “should not indulge in turmoil in the world and crises that are not ours.” “.
He was quoted as saying, “The worst thing we Europeans can do is to be observant on this issue and adapt to the American rhythm and the Chinese overreaction.” “Why should we walk at the pace chosen by someone else?”
These remarks were provided to a select group of journalists upon his return from a three-day state visit to China.
China regards democratically ruled Taiwan as its own territory and has never renounced the use of force to bring the island under its control.
Taiwan’s government, which enjoys security guarantees from the United States, strongly disputes China’s claims.
The Chinese military announced earlier on Monday that it was “combat ready” after three days of large-scale combat exercises that simulated the island’s closure.
The exercise came in response to Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen’s visit to the United States last week when she met House Speaker Kevin McCarthy in California.
Macron’s interview sparked outrage on both sides of the Atlantic as lawmakers chafed at his soft stance on the issue of China and Taiwan.
The German lawmaker, who is close to former leader Angela Merkel, has blasted the French president over his trip to Beijing, calling it a “PR coup” for the Chinese regime.
German parliamentarian Norbert Roettgen said Macron “has succeeded in turning his trip to China into a public relations coup for Xi and a disaster for Europe’s foreign policy.”
He is ‘increasingly isolating himself in Europe,’ said the influential conservative lawmaker, who sits on the German parliament’s foreign affairs committee.
It is the latest foreign policy blunder by the 45-year-old French head of state who has warned Russia that Russia must not be humiliated in any future peace talks over Ukraine.
But his downbeat attitude toward China has angered diplomats and lawmakers in the United States, which has been the largest provider of Western support to Ukraine.
Nathan Sales, the acting undersecretary of state under Donald Trump’s presidency, said the French position could harm relations with its Western allies.
“Xi Jinping would like nothing better than to divide the transatlantic alliance, and President Macron’s erratic comments open the door to exactly that,” he told DailyMail.com.
Macron appears to be out of touch, not only with the United States, but with the rest of Europe.
He added, “In the aftermath of the Ukraine war in particular, Europeans realize the importance of American leadership and realize that a world led by an authoritarian power like Beijing will be hostile to European values.”
Republican Mike Gallagher, who has represented Wisconsin’s 8th district since 2017, said the remarks were “embarrassing” and shameful.
“This is a massive propaganda victory for the Chinese Communist Party,” he told Fox News.
“The irony and the tragedy is that they actually make the war across the Taiwan Strait more likely,” the congressman added.
Marco Rubio, the Republican senator representing Florida, took to social media to attack the French leader, accusing him of undermining relations with the United States.
Maybe we shouldn’t pick sides either. We should probably basically say we are going to focus on Taiwan and the threats posed by China and you guys are dealing with Ukraine and Europe,” added the 51-year-old 2016 presidential candidate.
Neil Gardiner, director of the Margaret Thatcher Center for Freedom at the Heritage think tank, criticized Macron for ‘playing the useful idiot to Beijing’. “
“His appeasement of China is an embarrassment to France,” he said.
Yvo Daalder, a former US ambassador to NATO under the Obama administration, said Macron is a hypocrite because he is “completely OK with relying on US security commitments to address crises like Ukraine in Europe”.
But the White House sought to defuse the row, with National Security Council spokesman John Kirby saying the Biden administration remains “comfortable and confident in the wonderful bilateral relationship we have with France.”
France’s deputy ambassador to the United States, Aurelie Bonnal, insisted that “France and Europe will always be the close allies and partners of the United States.”
“France’s position on Taiwan has not changed,” she wrote on Twitter.
