President Donald Trump may have kicked the hornet’s nest by signing on Friday the “Taiwanese Travel Act”, encouraging official visits to Taiwan by officials at all levels with an emphasis on “national security officials.”

The signing angered the newly crowned Chinese President Emperor Xi Jinping, who lashed out at Trump and the US during a speech on Tuesday marking the start of his second term running the world’s most populous country. Xi warned that attempts to sow divisions between China and Taiwan would be “punished by history”.

His speech follows Chinese bureaucrats’ rubber-stamping changes to the constitution that could allow Xi to serve as leader for life, or as some have correctly defined it, emperor.

“Any actions or tricks to separate the country are bound to fail,” Xi said. “They will receive the condemnation of the people and the punishment of history.”

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“We cannot allow, and it is impossible for, an inch of our great country’s territory to separate from China,” said Mr. Xi.

Also, several close Xi allies have been confirmed in senior government posts – though Xi somewhat unexpectedly named Yi Gang the next chairman of the People’s Bank of China, a veteran deputy governor whose only task it appears is to preserve continuity. China’s legislature also approved former anti-graft czar Wang Qishan as vice president and economic adviser Liu He – poised to become China’s financial superregulator – as vice premier.

Xi warned in his speech that China has the means to retaliate against attempts to divorce Taiwan from the mainland, per Bloomberg.

In an address to China’s almost 3,000-member national parliament, Xi said China had the capabilities to stop any attempt to formalize the democratically ruled island’s independence. The remarks came just days after U.S. President Donald Trump signed a law allowing high-level official visits to Taiwan, a move that would elevate its diplomatic status.

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