Nancy Pelosi is the highest-profile elected US official to visit Taiwan in 25 years.
US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's visit to Taiwan has ignited a diplomatic firestorm. An angry China has announced military drills, missile launches and sanctions on Taiwanese agricultural goods.
Here are five points on Nancy Pelosi:
- The 82-year-old is one of the most powerful politicians in the United States. She was re-elected as the Speaker of the House of Representatives for a fourth term in 2021. According to her website, Ms Pelosi is the first woman in US history to lead the House of Representatives. She was named as one of the most powerful women by Forbes magazine in 2021.
- The youngest of the seven children, Ms Pelosi grew up in Baltimore, Maryland, where her father was mayor. She went to college in Washington, where Ms Pelosi met financier Paul Pelosi and married him. They moved to San Franciso after marriage where Ms Pelosi was a housewife. The couple has five children - four daughters and a son.
- Nancy Pelosi started her political career in 1976, rising through the ranks of the Democratic Party in California and winning a seat in Congress in 1988. For 35 years, Speaker Pelosi has represented San Francisco, California's 12th District, in Congress.
- She was the biggest opponent of the United States' invasion of Iraq in 2003, calling it a "grotesque mistake". Her biggest moment, which still circulates as popular GIF on the internet, came when she clapped sarcastically after former US President Donald Trump's State of the Union address in 2018. She also famously ripped up Mr Trump's speech in front of television cameras a year later.
- Ms Pelosi has defended her visit to Taiwan despite the anger shown by China. In an op-ed in The Washington Post, she called on Americans to remember their commitment to supporting democracy in Taiwan, and around the world. But this is not the first time she has taken on the Chinese government. More than 30 years ago, she showed up in Tiananmen Square and unfurled a banner honoring dissidents killed in the 1989 protests, according to news agency Reuters.
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