The number of Chinese incursions into Taiwan’s air defense identification zone (ADIZ) last year was the highest since 1996, with the majority of them occurring in the zone’s southwest, a government-funded report has said.
Chinese military aircraft entered the nation’s ADIZ on 91 days from Jan. 1 to Nov. 30, the Institute for National Defense and Security Research said in a report on the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA).
Last year also saw the highest number of long-distance training missions by the Chinese military around Taiwan, the institute said, citing just six and 20 missions in 2016 and 2017 respectively.
Photo: Reuters
During the 1995-1996 Taiwan Strait missile crisis, China conducted a series of ballistic missile tests in the waters around Taiwan in the run-up to the nation’s first direct presidential election.
Ministry of National Defense spokesman Major General Shih Shun-wen (史順文) has said that the PLA flew about 380 sorties into the southwest ADIZ last year, a trend that has not been seen in the past.
The institute, which is affiliated with the ministry, said the Chinese intrusions are connected to the frequency of US military activities in the area, and are a warning over the warming of relations between Taiwan and the US.
There could be several reasons for the increase in intrusions, one of which is that China might be testing Taiwan’s military response capabilities, as the median line of the Taiwan Strait does not extend into the southwest ADIZ.
The PLA’s actions are also an effort to increase its presence in an attempt to expand China’s sphere of influence, the institute said.
Another reason could be to intimidate the Taiwanese military and exert pressure on its defenses on the Pratas Islands (Dongsha Islands, 東沙島) in the South China Sea.
An important factor to consider is that China is using marine patrol aircraft to collect underwater and other related information in the area, which is the main passageway for vessels and submarines entering the western Pacific, it said.
The PLA is also hoping to deter Taiwanese and US submarine activity in the region, it added.
The institute said that in the long-term, the intrusions could offer Taiwan certain advantages, such as increasing the legitimacy of US sales of offensive weapons to Taiwan.
A subsidiary of a Hong Kong-based company that has lost control of two critical ports on the Panama Canal said it is seeking US$2 billion of compensation in damages from Panama over its “illegal” takeover of the ports. Panama Ports Co, a unit of Hong Kong’s CK Hutchison Holdings (長江和記實業), on Friday said in a statement that it is demanding the sum under international arbitration proceedings that it had already started. The Panamanian government last week seized control of the Balboa and Cristobal ports on each end of the Panama Canal, after the country’s Supreme Court declared earlier that a concession allowing
DETERRENCE: With 1,000 indigenous Hsiung Feng II and III missiles and 400 Harpoon missiles, the nation would boast the highest anti-ship missile density in the world With Taiwan wrapping up mass production of Hsiung Feng II and III missiles by December and an influx of Harpoon missiles from the US, Taiwan would have the highest density of anti-ship missiles in the world, a source said yesterday. Taiwan is to wrap up mass production of the indigenous anti-ship missiles by the end of year, as the Chungshan Institute of Science and Technology has been meeting production targets ahead of schedule, a defense official with knowledge of the matter said. Combined with the 400 Harpoon anti-ship missiles Taiwan expects to receive from the US by 2028, the nation would have
POSSIBILITIES EMERGE: With Taiwan’s victory and Japan’s narrow win over Australia, Taiwan now have a chance to advance if South Korea also beat the Aussies Taiwan has high hopes that the national baseball team would advance to the World Baseball Classic (WBC) quarter-finals after clinching a crucial 5-4 victory over South Korea in a nail-biting extra-inning game at the Tokyo Dome yesterday. Boosted by three home runs — two solo shots by Yu Chang (張育成) and Cheng Tsung-che (鄭宗哲) and a two-run homer by Stuart Fairchild — the triumph gave Taiwan a much-needed second victory in the five-team Pool C, where only the top two finishers would advance to the knockout stage in Miami, Florida. Entering extra innings with the game tied at four apiece, Taiwan scored
MISSION OF PEACE: The foreign minister urged Beijing to respect Taiwan’s existence as an independent nation, and work together to ensure peace and stability in the region Minister of Foreign Affairs Lin Chia-lung (林佳龍) yesterday rejected Chinese Minister of Foreign Affairs Wang Yi’s (王毅) comments about Taiwan, criticizing China as a “troublemaker” in the international community and a disruptor of cross-strait peace. Speaking at a news conference on the sidelines of the Chinese National People’s Congress, Wang said that Taiwan has always been a territory of China and that it would be impossible for it to become its own country. The “return” of Taiwan to China was the natural outcome of the Chinese people’s resistance against Japan in World War II, and that any pursuit of independence was “doomed
RSS