China and the United States could face a “military conflict” over the future of Taiwan, which is the “biggest tinderbox” between the two countries, China’s ambassador to the U.S. said in an interview with National Public Radio, Bloomberg reports.
Qin Gang, who assumed his post in Washington, D.C. last July, told NPR in unusually direct remarks that if the Taiwanese authorities, “emboldened by the United States,” keep going down the road for independence, it will most likely result in military conflict between China and the U.S.
Qin said Beijing is ready for the 2022 Winter Olympic Games and he dismissed reports of human rights abuses in the Xinjiang region, saying only “terrorists” are being sent to prisons while others are attending “vocational schools,” according to Friday’s NPR report.
With the 2022 Winter Olympic Games set to start in Beijing next week, human rights groups have called for a full-blown boycott as a protest against issues including China’s alleged mistreatment of ethnic Uyghurs, Tibetans and other minority groups, and its national security crackdown on Hong Kong. Biden declared a diplomatic boycott on Dec. 6, meaning U.S. officials won’t attend but athletes are free to go.