China on Monday conducted extensive military drills in the vicinity of Taiwan and its surrounding islands, which it described as a ‘stern warning’ against Taiwanese independence.
The Chinese defence ministry stated that the exercises were a reaction to the refusal of Taiwan’s President Lai Ching-te to accede to Beijing’s insistence that Taiwan recognise itself as part of the People’s Republic of China, governed by the Communist Party.
Taiwan’s defence ministry denounced the drills as a provocation and declared its readiness to respond.
Navy Senior Captain Li Xi, spokesperson for the PLA‘s Eastern Theater Command, announced the mobilization of the navy, army air force, and missile corps for the exercises.
“This is a major warning to those who back Taiwan independence and a signifier of our determination to safeguard our national sovereignty,” Li said in a message on the service’s public media channel.
Taiwan, formerly a Japanese colony, was united with China following World War II. However, it separated in 1949 when Chiang Kai-shek’s Nationalists retreated to the island as Mao Zedong‘s Communists took control of the mainland.
Lai assumed office in May, continuing the Democratic Progressive Party’s eight-year rule, which rejects China’s demand for Taiwan to acknowledge itself as part of China. China consistently maintains that Taiwanese independence is a
“dead end” and that annexation by Beijing is historically inevitable.
The Chinese drills occurred shortly after US secretary of state Antony Blinken cautioned Beijing against responding to a speech by Taiwanese President Lai Ching-te during Taiwan’s National Day celebrations.
In recent years, China has intensified its military activities around Taiwan, dispatching warplanes and other military aircraft while its ships maintain a nearly constant presence in the island’s surrounding waters.
The ongoing dispute between China and Taiwan originates from a civil war in which Chiang Kai-shek’s nationalist forces were defeated by Mao Zedong’s communist fighters, leading to their retreat to Taiwan in 1949.