Donald Trump Taiwan leader call: China foreign minister hopes relations not damaged

Published 10:16 pm Friday, December 2, 2016

TAIPEI, Taiwan (AP) — The Latest on President-elect Donald Trump’s call to Taiwan’s leader (all times local):

12:10 p.m.

China’s foreign minister says he hopes Beijing’s relations with the U.S. won’t be “interfered with or damaged” after President-elect Donald Trump broke with decadeslong diplomatic tradition and spoke directly with Taiwan’s leader.

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Hong Kong’s Phoenix TV reports that Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi said Saturday the call between Taiwan’s president and Trump was “just a small trick by Taiwan.” He said he thought it would not change longstanding U.S. policy toward China.

Wang says the so-called “one-China policy” is the cornerstone of U.S.-China relations and that Beijing hoped that foundation would not be “interfered with or damaged.”

It is highly unusual, probably unprecedented, for a U.S. president or president-elect to speak directly with a leader of Taiwan, a self-governing island the U.S. broke diplomatic ties with in 1979.