CHINA urged global leaders today to not interfere in its internal affairs after they congratulated Lai Ching-te for winning Taiwan’s presidential elections.

Mr Ching-te won a third term in power for the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) in Saturday’s elections with some 40 per cent of the vote.

He is taking over from DPP’s Tsai Ing-wen and promises to continue her foreign policy efforts in cutting ties with China.

A spokesperson for the United States State Department congratulated the Taiwanese people “for once again demonstrating the strength of their robust democratic system and electoral process.”

But US President Joe Biden reiterated that the US does not support Taiwanese independence.

The US switched diplomatic recognition from Taipei to Beijing in 1979 but maintains unofficial relations with the island, as well as being its largest arms supplier.

China’s Foreign Ministry said that the US State Department statement “seriously violated US promises that it would only maintain cultural, economic and other non-official ties with Taiwan.”

Japanese Foreign Minister Yoko Kamikawa’s congratulations was also slammed by the Chinese embassy in Tokyo as “a serious interference in China’s internal affairs.”

The Chinese ministry said that it had lodged “solemn representations” with the US and Japan over the comments.

And in Britain, Foreign Secretary David Cameron said that the result was a “testament to Taiwan’s vibrant democracy,” to which the Chinese embassy in Britain said it “firmly opposed the wrong practices of the British side.”

It urged the British government to “stop any words or deeds that interfere in China’s internal affairs.”

China views Taiwan as part of its territory.

Taiwan Affairs Office spokesman Chen Binhua said that “Taiwan is China’s Taiwan,” saying: “This election cannot change the basic pattern and direction of development of cross-strait relations … that the motherland will eventually be reunified.”

Taiwan’s foreign ministry condemned the comments as “fallacious,” “absurd,” and “not worthy of rebuttal.”

It said that claiming Taiwan was an “internal Chinese matter” was “totally inconsistent with the international perception and the cross-strait situation and goes against the expectation of the global democratic community, and the will of the people of Taiwan in insisting on the value of democracy.”