Disregarding the repeated warnings by the Chinese side, US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi paid a visit to China's Taiwan on Aug 2 in an attempt to undermine the one-China principle. Yet her visit cannot change the reality that Taiwan is an integral part of China.

Pelosi's attempt to hollow out the one-China principle is unacceptable and doomed to fail, because the principle is based on historical and legal facts. Taiwan is an inalienable part of China, and will remain so.

The one-China principle is recognized by the international community, including the successive United States administrations since the normalization of Sino-US diplomatic relations in 1979. China has diplomatic relations with 181 countries and all those countries recognize and abide by the one-China principle. Pelosi's visit to the island cannot change that fact.

Pelosi's sneaky visit to Taiwan has been condemned by people across the Taiwan Straits and beyond. More than 170 countries and international organizations voiced their support for the one-China principle, with UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres and leaders of many UN member states affirming it.

As soon as Pelosi ended her visit, China began conducting live military fire drills around the island and imposed a series of sanctions on the US House speaker and her relatives and other US entities.

People may ask why China has reacted so strongly to Pelosi's visit to the island. The answer is that the Chinese people across the Straits and those in other parts of the world aspire for the complete reunification of the Chinese nation, and see Taiwan as an inseparable part of China.

The US has diplomatic relations with the People's Republic of China, which is the sole legal representative of China, a fact that the United Nations and most of the countries across the world recognize. This is the bottom-line which cannot be challenged and trampled upon by anyone, not even the US president, let alone the House speaker.

In recent years, the US' attempts to hollow out the one-China principle and violate the promises it made in the three joint communiques it has signed with China have become even more blatant. The US has been slowly changing its one-China policy by issuing laws such as the "Taiwan Relations Act" and citing the "Six Assurances"－six key foreign policy principles the US unilaterally designed to guide its relations with the island but never recognized by Beijing.

Washington has also been colluding more frequently with the Taiwan authorities and flexing its muscles across the Straits to bolster "Taiwan independence" forces on the island.

All these facts show that it is the US and the separatist forces on the island that are undermining the one-China principle and trying to change the status quo across the Straits. But the US will have to pay a heavy price for its foolhardy and irresponsible acts, because the Chinese side will not tolerate any interference in its internal matters.

The days when Taiwan was seen as an unsinkable aircraft carrier of the US are gone. And Pelosi's and her fellow politicians' daydream of hollowing out the one-China principle will turn into a nightmare.

Along with Pelosi, island leader Tsai Ing-wen staged the farce of official interaction between the US and Taiwan. On March 14, 2005, Beijing promulgated the Anti-secession Law, cementing the one-China principle and making clear the preconditions under which the Chinese mainland will resort to non-peaceful means to deter any attempts to secede Taiwan from the motherland.

Separatist-minded Democratic Progressive Party leaders such as Tsai, guilty of trying to split the country, ought to be brought to justice.

There is no doubt that the Chinese nation's complete reunification will be realized. Indeed, the goal of national reunification as part of the national rejuvenation is not far from being realized, which people on both sides of the Straits will celebrate.

Zhu Fenglian, the spokesperson for the State Council Taiwan Affairs Office, has said that we will not leave the task of the reunification to our next generation, and Huang Chih-hsien, a well-known TV commentator and author based in Taiwan, stressed that our generation (living in Taiwan) is determined to reunify Taiwan with the motherland.

All US attempts to contain China by exploiting the Taiwan question will be strongly countered, so will the wishful thinking of the Taiwan authorities to seek "Taiwan independence" by soliciting US support. Those who move against the trend of peaceful development will surely be nailed to the pillar of shame in history.

The author is a Beijing-based commentator on international affairs. The views don't necessarily represent those of China Daily.

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