China deployed aircraft and ships to encircle Taiwan on Monday in exercises Beijing said were aimed at sending a “stern warning” to “separatist” forces on the self-ruled island.
Beijing has not ruled out using force to bring Taiwan under its control, and Monday’s drills represent the fourth round of large-scale war games in the past two years.
China’s exercises come days after US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken warned Beijing against taking action in response to a speech by Taiwanese President Lai Ching-te during the island’s National Day celebrations.
Lai, who took office in May, has been more outspoken than his predecessor Tsai Ing-wen in defending Taiwan’s sovereignty, angering Beijing, which calls him a “separatist”. Taiwan condemned the latest exercises as “irrational and provocative” and said it had sent “appropriate forces” in response.
AFP journalists near Hsinchu Air Force Base, in northern Taiwan, saw four fighter jets take off on Monday.
The exercises, called Joint Sword-2024B, “test the joint operations capabilities of theater command troops,” Beijing said.
They are taking place in “areas north, south and east of the island of Taiwan,” said Capt. Li Xi, a spokesman for China’s Eastern Theater Command.
The drills are “focused on the topics of sea-air combat readiness patrolling, the blockade of key ports and areas,” Li said.
They also practiced “attacking sea and land targets” and “jointly seizing total superiority”.
China’s coast guard was also dispatched to conduct “inspections” around the island.
A diagram released by the Coast Guard shows four fleets surrounding Taiwan and moving counterclockwise around the island.
Taiwan said it had detected “convoys” of Chinese coast guard vessels “in our northern, southwestern and eastern waters”.
China has stepped up its military activity around Taiwan in recent years, sending warplanes and other military aircraft, while its ships maintain a near-constant presence around the island’s waters.
Taiwan said on Sunday it had intercepted a Chinese aircraft carrier group south in the Bashi Channel, a waterway that separates the island from the Philippines, which appeared to be heading for the western Pacific.
“In the face of enemy threats, all officers and soldiers of the country are on full alert,” Taiwan’s defense ministry said Monday.
We are determined and confident to ensure the security of national defense. – ‘Provocations’ – In his speech on Thursday, Lai pledged to “oppose the annexation” of the island and insisted that Beijing and Taipei “are not subservient to each other”. China warned after the speech that Lai’s “provocations” would lead to a “catastrophe” for the people of Taiwan. On Monday, Beijing said the exercises were a “legitimate and necessary operation to protect state sovereignty and national unity”. Beijing’s state broadcaster CCTV released a video warning: “the greater the provocation, the tighter the reins.” The current dispute between China and Taiwan dates back to a civil war in which Chiang Kai-shek’s Nationalist forces were defeated by Mao Zedong’s communist fighters and fled to Taiwan in 1949. Lai’s Democratic Progressive Party has long defended the sovereignty and democracy of Taiwan, which has its own government, military and currency. Beijing has sought to erase Taipei from the international scene, blocking it from global forums and poaching its diplomatic allies.
(Except for the headline, this story was not edited by NDTV staff and was published by a syndicated channel.)
