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The de facto US and Canadian embassies in Taiwan have praised the quality of pineapples grown on the island, releasing photographs of their top diplomats in Taipei with the fruit after an import ban by China.
Key points:
- China has placed a trade ban on Taiwanese pineapples claiming they contain "harmful creatures"
- The ban is the latest recent rise in tensions between the two nations
- Top US and Canadian diplomats in Taiwan have thrown their support behind Taiwan's "freedom pineapples"
China last week stopped the import of Taiwanese pineapples, citing "harmful creatures" it said could come with the fruit.
Infuriated Taiwanese authorities called the ban a political move to further pressure the island, a charge that China denied.
LoadingWhile neither the United States nor Canada, like most countries, have formal diplomatic ties with the Chinese-claimed island, both have their own disputes with Beijing over human rights, trade and other issues.
While Taiwan is best known internationally for its thriving tech companies, the sub-tropical island has a flourishing fruit industry. Last year, more than 90 per cent of Taiwan's 46,000 tonnes of exported pineapples went to China.
Referencing a tweet by Taiwan Foreign Minister Joseph Wu for people around the world to "rally behind the #FreedomPineapple", the Canadian Trade Office, on Taipei's Facebook page, used the same hashtag on a picture of its chief, Jordan Reeves, posing with colleagues around a pineapple pizza.
"We in the Canadian Office like pineapple pizza, especially pineapples from Taiwan!" it wrote, adding that the idea to put pineapple on a pizza was invented by a Canadian in 1962.
The American Institute in Taiwan, under the hashtags #realfriendsrealprogress and #pineapplesolidarity, posted Facebook pictures of pineapples on their Taipei premises, including of its director Brent Christensen with three on his desk.
"Have you bought your pineapples? We have!" it wrote.
Local politicians have, meanwhile, posted pictures of themselves in fields with farmers and tucking into the fruit on their social media pages, encouraging domestic consumers as well as other countries to pick up the slack left by China.
Reuters: Ben Blanchard
)Tensions rising between Taiwan and China
The pineapple ban from China is just the latest escalation in tensions between the two nations.
Beijing, which has never renounced the use of force to bring Taiwan under its control, has carried out repeated air missions in the south-western corner of Taiwan's air defence identification zone in recent months.
Taiwan's air force scrambled for a second straight day recently after a dozen Chinese fighter aircraft and bombers carried out drills close to Taiwan-controlled islands in the disputed South China Sea.
Asked at a news briefing last month about the air forces' recent activities, Chinese Defence Ministry spokesman Wu Qian said Taiwan was an inseparable part of China.
Mr Wu said a "handful" of people in Taiwan were seeking the island's independence.
"We warn those 'Taiwan independence' elements: those who play with fire will burn themselves, and 'Taiwan independence' means war," he added.
Reuters