No need for Taiwan to worry about U.S.-China trade talks: Rubio

Taipei, Oct. 26 (CNA) U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Sunday that Taiwan should not be concerned about being used as a bargaining chip in the ongoing U.S.-China trade talks.

"I don't think you're going to see some trade deal where, if what people are worried about is, we're going to get some trade deal or we're going to get favorable treatment on trade in exchange for walking away from Taiwan," Rubio told reporters aboard his airplane traveling between Israel and Qatar en route to Asia.

"No one is contemplating that," Rubio said, according to a Reuters report.

A U.S. Treasury spokesman told reporters on Sunday that the U.S. and China conducted "very constructive" trade talks in Malaysia on Saturday, ahead of a highly anticipated meeting between President Donald Trump and Chinese leader Xi Jinping (習近平) in South Korea next week.

"Today's talks have concluded. They have been very constructive, and we expect them to resume in the morning," the spokesman told AFP, referring to the meeting between the world's two superpowers led by U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and China's Vice Premier He Lifeng (何立峰) in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.

The meeting took place before Trump's scheduled meeting with Xi in South Korea next Thursday, one day before the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit in Korea.

Trump has made it clear that he hopes to reach a "good" deal with China and end the trade war. On Friday, he told reporters that he would bring up the Taiwan issue during his meeting with Xi.

"I will be talking about Taiwan [with Xi]," Trump said before departing for his trip to Asia. The president also expressed "a lot of respect for Taiwan."

Taiwan has long been a thorny issue between Washington and Beijing, with the latter seeing it as part of its territory, to be unified by force if necessary.

Washington, meanwhile, is a close ally of Taiwan despite the lack of official ties between the two sides and has regularly provided defensive weapons to help Taipei amid rising military threats from Beijing.

Two Taiwanese scholars told CNA that Taiwan is not the most pressing issue for both Washington and Beijing to deal with, and Trump is not expected to make any major adjustment to Washington's long-held stance on Taiwan's sovereignty when meeting Xi.

However, the Taiwan issue is still the most "sensitive, critical, and core issue" for both sides, Chang Wu-ueh (張五岳), director of the Center for Cross-Strait Relations at Tamkang University in New Taipei, told CNA.

That is why America and China's top leaders need to make sure both understand the other's "bottom line" on the Taiwan issue to avoid misjudgment by either side, which could lead to confrontations, Chang said.

Wang Hsin-hsien (王信賢), a professor with the Institute of International Relations at National Chengchi University (NCCU), meanwhile, told CNA that Trump wanted to focus the bilateral talks with Xi on rare earth, fentanyl and soybeans.

Wang believes it is Beijing that brought up the Taiwan issue for discussions between Xi and Trump.

Trump is unlikely to make any major concessions to Xi on Taiwan, and is likely to keep the same stance as his immediate predecessor Joe Biden, Wang said.

Taiwan's Foreign Minister Lin Chia-lung (林佳龍) on Wednesday said that the U.S. has assured Taiwan that its interests will not be harmed when Trump meets with Xi on the sidelines of the APEC summit in South Korea.

"The U.S. side has repeatedly told us that it remains steadfast in its support for Taiwan and that its exchanges with China will not harm Taiwan's interests," Lin said during a legislative session.