New Taiwan President Lai Ching-te Faces Big Challenges

Taiwan’s president, Lai Ching-te, was sworn into office on Monday, facing hard choices about how to secure the island democracy’s future in turbulent times — with wars flaring abroad, rifts in the United States over American security priorities, and divisions in Taiwan over how to preserve the brittle peace with China.

Mr. Lai began his four-year term as Taiwan’s president in a morning ceremony, ahead of giving an inaugural speech laying out his priorities to an audience outside the presidential office building in Taipei, Taiwan’s capital.

He has said that he would keep strengthening ties with Washington and other Western partners while resisting Beijing’s threats and enhancing Taiwan’s defenses. Yet he may also extend a tentative olive branch to Beijing, welcoming renewed talks if China’s leader, Xi Jinping, sets aside his key precondition: that Taiwan accept that it is a part of China.

“We’ll see an emphasis on continuity in national security, cross-strait issues and foreign policy,” said Lii Wen, an incoming spokesman for the new leader, whose Democratic Progressive Party promotes Taiwan’s separate status from China.

But Mr. Lai, 64, faces hurdles in trying to hold to the course set by his predecessor, Tsai Ing-wen.

Unlike Ms. Tsai, Mr. Lai is less seasoned in foreign policy negotiations, and has a record of combative remarks that can come back to haunt him. He also must deal with two emboldened opposition parties that early this year won a majority of seats in the legislature — a challenge that Ms. Tsai did not face in her eight years as president.