According to the Financial Times, the Pentagon’s senior China officer has landed in Taiwan.

TAIPEI, (Reuters) – According to the Financial Times, the Pentagon’s senior China official, Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense Michael Chase, has landed in Taiwan for a visit, which might escalate tensions between Beijing and Washington.

Taiwan’s Defense Ministry and the Pentagon both refused to comment.

“Although we do not have a comment on particular operations, engagements, or training, I would want to emphasise that our support for, and defence partnership with, Taiwan remains aligned against the present threat posed by the People’s Republic of China,” a Pentagon spokeswoman said.

Earlier, Taiwan Defense Minister Chiu Kuo-cheng said that he was “not very positive” that the trip would take place.

When asked whether Chase will be there, Chiu responded “those who are nice to us” are welcome.

“But it’s not clear yet,” he told reporters on the margins of a parliament session.

“I won’t get into specifics,” he stated. “I won’t elaborate until I get official notice.”

Chase would be the highest-ranking US defence official to visit the island since 2019.

China, which considers Taiwan to be its own territory, has frequently insisted that international diplomats refrain from visiting the democratically ruled island.

The United States and China are embroiled in a fierce dispute over the United States military’s shooting down of what it claimed a Chinese surveillance balloon off the coast of South Carolina earlier this month. China claims the balloon was used to monitor the weather.

In a statement issued in Beijing, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Wang Wenbin emphasised the government’s strong opposition to official exchanges and military relations between the US and Taiwan.

In August, China held war simulations near Taiwan in response to then-US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s visit to Taipei.

While the United States, like most other nations, has no formal diplomatic connections with Taiwan, it is the island’s largest weapons supplier, and the two maintain a tight security relationship, with U.S. defence officials visiting on occasion.

A two-star Navy admiral in charge of US military intelligence in the Asia-Pacific area paid an unannounced visit to Taiwan in 2020.