Nicaragua has severed ties with Taiwan and changed its allegiance to Beijing by Reuters

(Reuters) – Nicaragua on Thursday severed its long-standing diplomatic ties with Taiwan by shifting its allegiance to Beijing, recognizing the Chinese Communist Party’s one-size-fits-all policy and curtailing Taipei’s international allies.

“The Government of the Republic of Nicaragua is breaking off diplomatic relations with Taiwan and ceasing to have official relations or relations today,” the Foreign Ministry said in a statement issued in Spanish and English.

“The People’s Republic of China is the only legitimate government that represents the whole of China, and Taiwan is an undeniable part of China’s territory,” he added.

Taiwan responded quickly, expressing “grief and regret” over the decision, saying that Central American President Daniel Ortega had denied the friendship between Taiwan and Nicaragua.

But the Taiwanese government also expressed the challenge.

“As a member of the international community, Taiwan has the right to exchange and develop diplomatic relations with other countries,” its Foreign Ministry said.

Taiwan will continue to promote “pragmatic diplomacy” to expand its international space, and will strive to achieve the “necessary international status” in Taiwan.

China says Taiwan is one of the provinces without the right to seize a state, and has stepped up pressure to win the rest of Taiwan’s allies.

China’s ambassador to the United Nations, Zhang Jun, congratulated Nicaragua.

“We highly commend the correct decision taken by the Nicaraguan government, which is in line with the main trend of the time and the will of the people,” he said in a tweet. “The principle of a single China is a consensus widely accepted by the international community and does not accept challenges.”

The break with Taiwan is a blow to the United States. Relations between Ortega and Washington have deteriorated over the past few months, and the U.S. State Department has announced that it has imposed sanctions on National Security Adviser Nestor Moncada Lau Ortega for allegedly enriching members with a fraudulent import and customs scheme. Ortega’s government.

The White House and the State Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Last month, US President Joe Biden ripped off Ortega, who called the Nicaraguan presidential election a “pantomime” for former Marxist guerrillas and a US Cold War opponent who won the election for a fourth term in a row.

A Taiwanese-based diplomatic source familiar with the region said the move was not surprising, given Washington’s lack of power with Ortega over sanctions, and that it was a natural course of action for China to seek help and assistance.

“Ortega seems to have had enough,” the source told Reuters, speaking on condition of anonymity.

The Nicaraguan movement leaves only 14 formal diplomatic allies in Taiwan, most of them in Latin America and the Caribbean, plus a few small states.

Leaders coming to Honduras also continue to threaten to break with Taipei. However, since last month’s Honduran elections, Xiomara Castro, the incumbent president, has been rowing a bit from that position.

Before Nicaragua, Taiwan lost two allies in a row in September 2019, when the Solomon Islands and Kiribati moved to Beijing.