The Chinese Foreign Ministry announced today, Thursday, that Beijing has banned two senior executives from American defense companies from entering the country and frozen the companies' assets in response to their sale of arms to Taiwan. The measures take effect from today for General Atomics Aeronautical Systems, which manufactures unmanned aerial systems, and General Dynamics Land Systems, which is part of General Dynamics and produces military vehicles.
China stated that arms sales are a "flagrant interference" in its internal affairs and "harm" its sovereignty and territorial integrity. It added that "the continued sale of weapons by the United States to the Chinese region of Taiwan constitutes a serious violation of the One China principle and the terms of the three joint communiqués issued by the United States and China." The ministry clarified that it has frozen the assets of the two companies in China and prohibited the entry of the two executives into the country.
In the meantime, ongoing tensions between China and its neighbors will be highlighted today as the leaders of the United States, Japan, and the Philippines meet at the White House to respond to increasing pressure from Beijing on Manila in the disputed South China Sea.
President Joe Biden will announce new joint military efforts and infrastructure spending in the former American colony while hosting Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. and Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida in a historic trilateral summit. Disputes between China and the Philippines center around the Second Thomas Shoal, which has a small number of Philippine troops stationed on a rusting warship that Manila grounded there in 1999 to assert its sovereignty claims.
A U.S. official stated that "Biden will reaffirm that the Mutual Defense Treaty dating back to the 1950s, obligating Washington and Manila, will require the United States to respond to an armed attack on the Philippines in the Second Thomas Shoal area."
