The Ministry of Foreign Affairs said on Sunday that China has officially downgraded its diplomatic relations with Lithuania to the level of “charge d’affaires” to protest Taiwan’s establishment of a de facto embassy in Vilnius.
Lithuania allowed Taipei to officially open an office in the name of Taiwan. This is a major diplomatic departure. It ignores Beijing’s pressure campaign, which is trying to keep Taiwan isolated on the global stage.
“The Chinese government has to lower the diplomatic relations between the two countries… in order to safeguard its sovereignty and basic norms of international relations,” the ministry said in a statement.
The statement said: “The Lithuanian government must bear all the consequences arising therefrom,” adding that its actions “set a bad precedent on the international stage.”
China rejects the official use of the word “Taiwan” in order not to bring international legitimacy to this autonomous democratic island. Beijing claims it is part of its territory and vowed to occupy it one day.
Beijing added that Lithuania “abandoned the political commitments it made when establishing diplomatic relations with China”, referring to the “one-China policy” in which countries formally recognize the Chinese government instead of the Taiwanese government.
Taiwan announced that it will open an office in July, which is its first new diplomatic outpost in Europe in 18 years.
This move aroused strong condemnation from China. China withdrew its ambassador to Lithuania and asked Vilnius to do the same, and eventually it did the same.
China also stopped freight trains to Lithuania and stopped issuing food export licenses.
