Taiwan leader: I’m open to more Trump calls

Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen says she is open to having more direct phone calls with President Trump.

“We have the opportunity to communicate more directly with the U.S. government,” she told Reuters Thursday.

“We don’t exclude the opportunity to call President Trump himself, but it depends on the needs of the situation and the U.S. government’s consideration of regional affairs.”

{mosads}Tsai added she might tweet at Trump again, having not done so since he took office in January.

“Might not be a bad idea,” she said when asked about that option. “I’ll give some thought to it.”

Trump broke decades of U.S. protocol in December when he spoke with Tsai on the phone during his transition into the presidency.

The pair’s conversation was the first between a U.S. president or president-elect and a Taiwanese president since 1979, when the two nations severed ties.

Former President Jimmy Carter declared Beijing the sole government of China in 1979, ending formal U.S. diplomatic relations with Taiwan.

China, which views Taiwan as a breakaway province, raised a complaint with the U.S. last December about Trump’s call with Tsai.

“I must point out that there is only one China in the world and Taiwan is an inseparable part of the Chinese territory,” the Chinese Foreign Ministry said in a statement. “The ‘one China’ principle is the political foundation of China-U.S. relations.”

Trump reportedly promised Chinese President Xi Jinping in February that he would honor the “one China” policy.

The policy dictates that Washington recognizes Beijing as the only official government of China and will not establish formal relations with Taiwan.