WASHINGTON (BLOOMBERG) - US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said members of Congress won't be intimidated by China's reaction to her visit to Taiwan and that Chinese President Xi Jinping was acting "like a scared bully".

Just because Mr Xi "has his own insecurities, doesn't mean that I am going to have him do my schedule for members of Congress", Mrs Pelosi said on Tuesday (Aug 9) on NBC's Today show.

In a separate appearance on MSNBC's Morning Joe programme, Mrs Pelosi said China can't control the schedules of members of Congress, and, "We're not going to be accomplices to his isolation of Taiwan".

"I think he's in a fragile place," she said, referring to China's economy. "He's acting like a scared bully."

Mrs Pelosi's stop in Taiwan last week while in the Asia-Pacific region drew a strong response from China, which conducted military exercises designed to demonstrate its ability to encircle the island and launched missiles that likely flew over Taipei and into waters Japan claims as an exclusive economic zone.

She said her trip was meant to reinforce President Joe Biden's focus on the region, though the White House has repeatedly said the decision to go was the House speaker's alone.