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Just two days after Taiwan elected as its next leader Lai Ching-te, whom Beijing sees as a staunch separatist, it lost a diplomatic ally in its rivalry with China. Nauru, a tiny freckle of land in the Pacific Ocean, announced that it would be severing diplomatic relations with Taiwan, effective immediately.<\/p>\n
The Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs said it welcomed the decision by Nauru<\/a> and is ready to establish relations with it. Taiwan\u2019s foreign ministry indicated that it had no doubt that Beijing had orchestrated the Pacific island\u2019s shift, stating that<\/a> \u201cChina has been actively courting Nauru\u2019s political leaders for a long time, and using economic inducements to bring about a change of direction in the country\u2019s diplomacy.\u201d<\/p>\n A Taiwanese deputy foreign minister, Tien Chung-kwang, told a briefing in Taipei,<\/a> Taiwan\u2019s capital, that China had orchestrated Nauru\u2019s severing of relations to happen in the immediate wake of Taiwan\u2019s election on the weekend.<\/p>\n \u201cThe intent is to strike a blow against the democracy and freedom of which the Taiwanese people are so proud,\u201d Mr. Tien said. He said Taiwan had pre-emptively severed relations with Nauru after learning of its impending shift in loyalties.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n Such moves from Beijing have been widely expected in Taiwan in the wake of the victory for Mr. Lai, whose Democratic Progressive Party has campaigned on policies to distance the self-governing island democracy from China. Beijing claims Taiwan is its territory, and Chinese officials harbor a particular dislike for Mr. Lai, whom they call a pro-independence threat. Mr. Lai has said he wants to protect Taiwan\u2019s current status as a de facto independent democracy.<\/p>\n Nauru is the latest small nations to abruptly break relations with Taiwan, joining such countries as Honduras<\/a> and Nicaragua in switching diplomatic<\/a> allegiance to China. And it is one of a growing number of Pacific island nations that China has aggressively courted in its bid to dominate the region<\/a>.<\/p>\n