China’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA) Air Force yesterday said its aircraft had again flown around Taiwan, the latest in a series of exercises this month.
It said in a statement that it scrambled fighter jets, early warning aircraft, reconnaissance airplanes and H-6K bombers from multiple airfields for “combat military drills.”
The PLA Air Force said that its H-6K bombers had since Wednesday last week conducted numerous drills circling Taiwan “to improve its ability to safeguard national sovereignty and territorial integrity.”
The Ministry of National Defense in Taipei said that it sent aircraft and ships to monitor the activity and ensure the nation’s maritime and airspace security, adding that there were no “abnormal situations.”
In related news, Chinese Ministry of National Defense spokesman Colonel Wu Qian (吳謙) yesterday told a regular monthly news conference in Beijing that the PLA has put into service a new missile that Chinese media has dubbed the “Guam killer” for its ability to hit the US Pacific island territory with a conventional or nuclear warheads.
The military has begun putting into service the DF-26 intermediate-range ballistic missile, Wu said.
He gave few details, saying only that it can carry conventional, as well as nuclear, warheads and attack targets on land or at sea with precision.
China has made little secret of the DF-26 program, and the missile appeared in a major military parade in Beijing in 2015.
Wu also reiterated a warning by China’s Taiwan Affairs Office spokesman Ma Xiaoguang (馬曉光) on Wednesday that the PLA drills in the Taiwan Strait were designed to send a clear message to Taiwan, and that China would take further steps if pro-independence forces persisted in doing as they pleased.
“Engaging in Taiwan independence is a dead end,” Wu said.
ALIGNED THINKING: Taiwan and Japan have a mutual interest in trade, culture and engineering, and can work together for stability, Cho Jung-tai said Taiwan and Japan are two like-minded countries willing to work together to form a “safety barrier” in the Indo-Pacific region, Premier Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰) yesterday said at the opening ceremony of the 35th Taiwan-Japan Modern Engineering and Technology Symposium in Taipei. Taiwan and Japan are close geographically and closer emotionally, he added. Citing the overflowing of a barrier lake in the Mataian River (馬太鞍溪) in September, Cho said the submersible water level sensors given by Japan during the disaster helped Taiwan monitor the lake’s water levels more accurately. Japan also provided a lot of vaccines early in the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic,
Kaohsiung Mayor Chen Chi-mai (陳其邁) on Monday announced light shows and themed traffic lights to welcome fans of South Korean pop group Twice to the port city. The group is to play Kaohsiung on Saturday as part of its “This Is For” world tour. It would be the group’s first performance in Taiwan since its debut 10 years ago. The all-female group consists of five South Koreans, three Japanese and Tainan’s Chou Tzu-yu (周子瑜), the first Taiwan-born and raised member of a South Korean girl group. To promote the group’s arrival, the city has been holding a series of events, including a pop-up
TEMPORAL/SPIRITUAL: Beijing’s claim that the next Buddhist leader must come from China is a heavy-handed political maneuver that will fall flat-faced, experts said China’s requirement that the Dalai Lama’s reincarnation to be born in China and approved by Beijing has drawn criticism, with experts at a forum in Taipei yesterday saying that if Beijing were to put forth its own Dalai Lama, the person would not be recognized by the Tibetan Buddhist community. The experts made a remarks at the two-day forum hosted by the Tibet Religious Foundation of His Holiness the Dalai Lama titled: “The Snow Land Forum: Finding Common Ground on Tibet.” China says it has the right to determine the Dalai Lama’s reincarnation, as it claims sovereignty over Tibet since ancient times,
Temperatures in some parts of Taiwan are expected to fall sharply to lows of 15°C later this week as seasonal northeasterly winds strengthen, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said today. It is to be the strongest cold wave to affect northern Taiwan this autumn, while Chiayi County in the southwest and some parts of central Taiwan are likely to also see lower temperatures due to radiational cooling, which occurs under conditions of clear skies, light winds and dry weather, the CWA said. Across Taiwan, temperatures are to fall gradually this week, dropping to 15°C to 16°C in the early hours of Wednesday
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