Taiwan President Tsai Ing-wen sworn in for 2nd term

Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen called for stability in relations with China in her inaugural address Wednesday but said she would not accept Beijing's political terms that would "downgrade Taiwan and undermine the cross-strait status quo."

Reelected by a landslide late last year, Tsai said relations with Beijing had reached a "historical turning point" and that "peace, parity, democracy, and dialogue" should form the basis for contacts between the sides as a means to prevent intensifying antagonism and differences.

Tsai said Taiwan would also work to increase its participation in international society, even as Beijing seeks to shut it out and poach allies away from the self-governing island democracy it claims as its own territory.

Tsai represents the ruling Democratic Progressive Party which advocates Taiwan's formal independence, something Beijing says it will use force to prevent.

Her election to a second, four-year term came after the repression of pro-democracy protests in the nearby Chinese semi-autonomous region of Hong Kong solidified public opinion in Taiwan against moves toward accepting rule by Beijing.

The sides split amid civil war in 1949 and Beijing has cut off ties with Tsai’s government over her refusal to accept its demand that she recognize the island as a part of China to be unified with eventually under the “one country, two systems" policy enacted in Hong Kong.

Beijing's diplomats have prevented Taiwan from joining international gatherings such as the World Health Organization and reduced its number of diplomatic allies to a handful, while its military has boosted patrols and exercises aimed at intimidating the island's population. Tsai, 63, is a former law professor and unique in being the only modern woman leader in Asia to rise to the top without being part of a political dynasty.

(Image Credit: AP)