By Nellie Peyton
JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) – South Africa’s government said on Friday it had asked Taiwan to move its de facto embassy from the capital Pretoria, while Taiwan accused it of bowing to pressure from China.
South Africa rejected this characterization, saying the move was standard diplomatic practice, given that it severed political and diplomatic ties with Taiwan in 1997.
Taipei’s liaison office in Pretoria will be changed to a trade office and moved to the commercial capital of Johannesburg, South Africa’s Department of International Relations and Cooperation said.
“Relocating what will be renamed trade offices in both Taipei and Johannesburg… will be a true reflection of the non-political and non-diplomatic nature of the relationship between the Republic of South Africa and Taiwan,” it said in a statement, adding that it had given the office six months to move.
China is South Africa’s largest trading partner globally and one with which the country wants to expand cooperation in areas such as renewable energy.
Taiwan’s foreign ministry said warming relations between South Africa and China posed a challenge to its own friendly relationship with South Africa.
“If the South African government still insists on submitting to China and changing the status quo… the Ministry of Foreign Affairs will… study and formulate all possible responses to safeguard our country’s sovereignty and dignity,” the report said. in a statement.
Taiwan, which China claims as its own territory with no right to state-to-state relations, has formal ties with only a dozen countries, almost all of them small, less developed nations.
Taiwan’s government rejects China’s sovereignty claims, saying Beijing has no right to represent or speak for the island on the international stage
China welcomed the move.
“We appreciate South Africa’s correct decision to move Taipei’s liaison office in South Africa from Pretoria, the administrative capital,” said Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Mao Ning.
(Reporting by Nellie Peyton; Additional reporting by Joe Cash in Beijing and Ben Blanchard in Taipei; Editing by Olivia Kumwenda-Mtambo, William Maclean)