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China encircles Taiwan with warships, fighters
Taiwan’s defence ministry said in a statement that it detected 71 PLA aircraft and nine warships near Taiwan between 6am to 4pm on Saturday.
China’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA) on Saturday deployed warships and fighter jets to encircle the self-governed island of Taiwan, putting on an aggressive show of military might in response to Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen’s US stopover and meeting with House of Representatives speaker Kevin McCarthy earlier this week.
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China claims Taiwan as a breakaway region and resents official interaction between the island and a third country, terming it as interference in its internal affairs. Taiwan’s government strongly objects to China’s claims.
Taiwan’s defence ministry said in a statement that it detected 71 PLA aircraft and nine warships near Taiwan between 6am to 4pm on Saturday, with 45 of the warplanes crossing the median line of the Taiwan Strait and entering the southwestern part of the island’s air-defence identification zone.
Warships and warplanes passed over the median line in groups from the north, the centre and the south of the strait, according to the statement.
“The PLA deliberately created tension in the Taiwan Strait, which not only undermined peace and stability, but also had a negative impact on regional security and development,” the ministry said.
The exercise began on Saturday morning, a day after Tsai returned to Taiwan, following her visit to the Central American countries of Belize and Guatemala, and a high-profile stopover in the US, where she met and was hosted by top US diplomats and politicians.
The Chinese PLA’s eastern theatre command (ETC) said it launched “combat alert patrols” under the “Joint Sword” exercises in the Taiwan Strait, which divides the Chinese mainland from the island, “encircling” it from the north, south and east.
The PLA deployment around Taiwan includes long-range rocket, artillery, destroyers, frigates, missile boats, fighters, bombers, electronic warfare aircraft, aerial tankers and conventional missiles.
“The patrol and exercises take place in the maritime areas and airspace of the Taiwan Strait, off the northern and southern coasts of the island, and to the island’s east,” Shi Yi, a spokesperson for the ETC said in a statement, quoted by state media.
Calling the exercises a “stern warning to ‘Taiwan independence’ secessionist forces and their collusion with external forces”, Shi said they were a “necessary move to safeguard national sovereignty and territorial integrity”.
The three-day drills, between April 8-10, are expected to be the largest PLA military exercise since August 2022, when Chinese armed forces had similarly surrounded the island of less than 24 million people, launching missiles and exploding ordnances in response to then-US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s visit to Taipei.
“The patrols and drills will encircle the island of Taiwan from all four directions, effectively blockading and isolating it, with no foreign interference forces capable of entering or armed forces from the island of Taiwan capable of leaving,” Song Zhongping, a Chinese mainland military expert and TV commentator, told the state-run tabloid Global Times.
China’s maritime safety administration of eastern China’s Fujian province, according to the tabloid, issued a navigation warning notice on Friday that a live-fire shooting exercise will be held on Monday in an area off the shores of Pingtan, only about 130 km from Taiwan.
“Another navigation warning notice by the administration issued on Friday says live-fire shooting exercises will also be held on Saturday, Tuesday, Thursday, April 15, April 17 and April 20 in an area off the shores of Fuzhou, about 90 km north of Pingtan,’’ the report said.
The PLA navy had already deployed the Shandong Carrier Strike Group (CSG) off Taiwan’s east coast earlier this week. It transited the Bashi channel on Wednesday in its first training voyage in the Western Pacific.
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Tsai immediately denounced Saturday’s drills, pledging to work with “the US and other like-minded countries” in the face of “continued authoritarian expansionism”.
Taiwan’s mainland affairs council called for China to “exercise self-restraint”.
The Communist Party of China continues to “intimidate Taiwan militarily to undermine peace and stability in the Taiwan Strait as well as in the region”, the Council said, adding that the government firmly defends national sovereignty and democratic freedom.
“Taiwan will not back down or succumb, and we will not provoke or act rashly,” it added.
China’s announcement came hours after French President Emmanuel Macron left the country, where he met President Xi Jinping and other senior leaders. Macron urged Beijing to talk sense to Russia over the war in Ukraine.
European Union chief Ursula von der Leyen, also in China this week to meet Xi, said stability in the Taiwan Strait was of paramount importance.
Xi responded by saying that expecting China to compromise on Taiwan was “wishful thinking”, according to China’s official reading of the meeting.
China’s defence ministry, alongside the announcement of the drills around Taiwan also showed pictures on its home page of Xi meeting Macron and von der Leyen.
The Taiwan security source said China’s recent efforts to charm foreign leaders proved in vain after the announcement of the drills. “Upon the announcement of drills in the strait, all those efforts have vanished overnight and become a wasted effort.”
Last August, China, in only its third white paper on Taiwan since 1993 and the first after President Xi Jinping came to power in 2012, said it will not “renounce” the use of military force to bring the self-governed island under its control as its armed forces concluded the largest ever exercises around the island.
(With inputs from agencies)
