Two Chinese warships yesterday docked in a commercial port in Cambodia as part of the biggest-ever joint military drills with the Southeast Asian nation, with Beijing’s ambassador hailing their “ironclad” friendship.
Cambodia has long been a staunch ally of China and has received billions of dollars in investment.
The Jingangshan amphibious warfare ship and Qijiguang training ship sailed in to the Sihanoukville Autonomous Port as onlookers waved Cambodian and Chinese flags from the piers.
Photo: AFP
The port is north of the Ream Naval Base, which was originally built partly using US funds and is where China has financed a broad expansion project.
That construction has been carefully watched by the US and others over concerns it could become a new outpost for the Chinese navy on the Gulf of Thailand.
The gulf is adjacent to the South China Sea, which China claims virtually in its entirety, and would give easy access to the Malacca Strait, one of the most important shipping lanes in the world.
Chinese Ambassador to Cambodia Wang Wentian (王文天) dismissed concerns about Ream, telling reporters at Sihanoukville that wherever the Chinese navy sails “we bring friendship, we bring cooperation” and nothing else.
“The cooperation between the two armies, between China and Cambodia, is conducive to the security of both countries and the security of the region,” he said, standing on the pier.
The Chinese vessels docked at the port as part of 15 days of land and sea drills involving 760 Chinese military personnel along with about 1,300 Cambodians and 11 Cambodian vessels.
The Qijiguang bore a banner reading: “Bring peace and friendship to meet good friends” as it approached the port.
“We are ironclad friends,” Wang said.
Two Chinese warships docked at Ream in December last year for the first time after work began to expand the base. Cambodian officials last year denied a new 363m pier at Ream was intended to berth aircraft carriers.
At the start of the drills on Thursday, China’s military showed off its hardware including so-called “robodogs” — remote-controlled four-legged robots with automatic rifles mounted on their backs.
Handlers kept the dogs of war on the leash, demonstrating only their walking capabilities to watching journalists and top brass — not their shooting skills.
US PUBLICATION: The results indicated a change in attitude after a 2023 survey showed 55 percent supported full-scale war to achieve unification, the report said More than half of Chinese were against the use of force to unify with Taiwan under any circumstances, a survey conducted by the Atlanta, Georgia-based Carter Center and Emory University found. The survey results, which were released on Wednesday in a report titled “Sovereignty, Security, & US-China Relations: Chinese Public Opinion,” showed that 55.1 percent of respondents agreed or somewhat agreed that “the Taiwan problem should not be resolved using force under any circumstances,” while 24.5 percent “strongly” or “somewhat” disagreed with the statement. The results indicated a change in attitude after a survey published in “Assessing Public Support for (Non)Peaceful Unification
The CIA has a message for Chinese government officials worried about their place in Chinese President Xi Jinping’s (習近平) government: Come work with us. The agency released two Mandarin-language videos on social media on Thursday inviting disgruntled officials to contact the CIA. The recruitment videos posted on YouTube and X racked up more than 5 million views combined in their first day. The outreach comes as CIA Director John Ratcliffe has vowed to boost the agency’s use of intelligence from human sources and its focus on China, which has recently targeted US officials with its own espionage operations. The videos are “aimed at
SHIFT: Taiwan’s better-than-expected first-quarter GDP and signs of weakness in the US have driven global capital back to emerging markets, the central bank head said The central bank yesterday blamed market speculation for the steep rise in the local currency, and urged exporters and financial institutions to stay calm and stop panic sell-offs to avoid hurting their own profitability. The nation’s top monetary policymaker said that it would step in, if necessary, to maintain order and stability in the foreign exchange market. The remarks came as the NT dollar yesterday closed up NT$0.919 to NT$30.145 against the US dollar in Taipei trading, after rising as high as NT$29.59 in intraday trading. The local currency has surged 5.85 percent against the greenback over the past two sessions, central
‘MISGUIDED EDICT’: Two US representatives warned that Somalia’s passport move could result in severe retaliatory consequences and urged it to reverse its decision Minister of Foreign Affairs Lin Chia-lung (林佳龍) has ordered that a special project be launched to counter China’s “legal warfare” distorting UN Resolution 2758, a foreign affairs official said yesterday. Somalia’s Civil Aviation Authority on Wednesday cited UN Resolution 2758 and Mogadishu’s compliance with the “one China” principle as it banned people from entering or transiting in the African nation using Taiwanese passports or other Taiwanese travel documents. The International Air Transport Association’s system shows that Taiwanese passport holders cannot enter Somalia or transit there. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) protested the move and warned Taiwanese against traveling to Somalia or Somaliland
RSS