Taiwan has ‘right to remain free’, US senator says in visit criticised by China

Roger Wicker and Deb Fischer meet island’s president in Taipei as Beijing says trip sends ‘gravely wrong signal’

A visit to Taiwan by two US senators has drawn criticism from China, which claims the island as its own and objects to any contact between officials of the two sides.

The chair of the Senate armed services committee, Roger Wicker, and the Nebraska senator Deb Fischer arrived in Taipei on Friday for a series of high-level meetings with senior Taiwanese leaders to discuss US-Taiwan relations, regional security, trade and investment, according to the American Institute in Taiwan, Washington’s de facto embassy in lieu of formal diplomatic relations with the self-governing island democracy.