UPDATE 1-US says China spreads 'false' World War Two narratives to pressure Taiwan

China is intentionally mischaracterising World War Two-era documents to put pressure on, and isolate, Taiwan, as those accords made no determination of the island's ultimate political status, the de facto U.S. embassy in Taipei said.

The 80th anniversary of the war's end has been marked by a bitter dispute between Taipei and Beijing on its broader historical meaning and relevance today. Beijing says documents such as the Cairo Declaration and Potsdam Proclamation support its legal claims of sovereignty over the island, as they call for Taiwan to be "restored" to Chinese rule at a time when it was a colony of Japan.

The Chinese government at the time was the Republic of China, which fled in 1949 to Taiwan after losing a subsequent civil war with Mao Zedong's communists. The Republic of China remains Taiwan's formal name, and its government says no World War Two agreements made any mention of Mao's People's Republic of China because it did not exist then, so that Beijing has no right to claim Taiwan now.

"China intentionally mischaracterises World War Two-era documents, including the Cairo Declaration, the Potsdam Proclamation, and the Treaty of San Francisco, to try to support its coercive campaign to subjugate Taiwan," the American Institute in Taiwan said in an statement on Monday. "Beijing's narratives are simply false, and none of these documents determined Taiwan's ultimate political status," the de facto U.S. embassy added in the statement emailed to Reuters.

Japan signed the San Francisco Peace Treaty in 1951, renouncing its claims to Taiwan, though the island's sovereignty is left unresolved in that pact. Beijing says the treaty is "illegal and invalid", as it was not a party to it. China's foreign ministry expressed "strong dissatisfaction" at Monday's comments, saying they were misleading.

"A series of documents with legal effect, such as the Cairo Declaration and the Japanese surrender document, clearly confirm China's sovereignty over Taiwan and the status of Taiwan," ministry spokesperson Lin Jian said in Beijing. The United States ended official ties with Taipei in 1979 when it recognised Beijing, but remains the island's most important international backer.

Washington follows a "one China policy" by which it officially takes no position on Taiwan's sovereignty and only acknowledges China's position on the subject. "False legal narratives are part of Beijing's broader campaign to try to isolate Taiwan from the international community and constrain the sovereign choices of other countries regarding their interactions with Taiwan," added the American Institute in Taiwan.

Taiwan Foreign Minister Lin Chia-lung expressed his thanks for the U.S. mission's statement. "Our country and the People's Republic of China are not subordinate to each other, and the People's Republic of China has no right to represent Taiwan in the international community," Lin said in a statement.

On September 3, Chinese President Xi Jinping oversaw a massive military parade in Beijing to mark the war anniversary.

(This story has not been edited by Devdiscourse staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)