Staff writer, with CNA
Increased activity by the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) near Taiwan this week was likely not a response to President William Lai’s (賴清德) recent stopovers in the US, the American Institute in Taiwan (AIT) said yesterday.
“The elevated activity in the East China Sea and South China Sea follows a broader increase in the PLA’s military posture and military exercises over the last several years. With that said, we do not see this wider activity as a response to President Lai’s transit,” an AIT spokesperson said.
Photo: Chiang Ying-ying, AP
“We [the US] continue to call on the PRC [People’s Republic of China] to avoid any destabilizing or escalatory actions that might undermine regional peace and stability and will continue coordinating with allies and partners regarding our shared concerns,” the spokesperson said.
China from Monday to Wednesday designated seven areas east of Zhejiang Province and its Fujian Province as “temporary reserved” airspace, which typically indicates airspace reserved for military activities.
Foreign media reported that the PLA activity could mean another round of military exercises in response to Lai’s trip to the South Pacific from Nov. 30 to Friday last week, which included stopovers in Hawaii and the US territory of Guam.
The AIT said that although Beijing has not announced a “Joint Sword” military exercise in response to Lai’s transits, the elevated military activity in the region was consistent with levels the US has seen during other large exercises.
China’s latest military activity in the area followed the identification of 100 PLA aircraft operating around Taiwan in a 48-hour period starting at 6am on Monday.
The Ministry of National Defense earlier yesterday said that in the 24 hours to 6am, it had detected 34 Chinese military aircraft operating around the nation, down from 53 aircraft it reported the previous day.
However, there was a rise in PLA Navy ships in the area to 16 from 11 the prior day, the ministry said.
Twenty-two of the planes crossed the median line of the Taiwan Strait and flew into Taiwan’s northern, southwestern and eastern air defense identification zone, a ministry map showed.
Two officials familiar with the security situation in the region said that PLA Navy and China Coast Guard vessels are moving north, showing signs that the forces are being pulled back.
The defence ministry later on Thursday night said that an emergency response centre set up earlier this week to deal with recent Chinese military activities had been disbanded, likely signalling the end of to China’s manoeuvres around the island.
Separately, US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin on Wednesday told the DefenseScoop news Web site that the Pentagon is keeping a close eye on security conditions in and around Taiwan.
“Certainly, this latest activity is something that we will continue to monitor and make sure that nobody does anything to change the status quo in the [Taiwan Strait],” Austin told a news conference closing out a trip to Japan, the site reported.
“Our policy hasn’t changed. We’ll continue to do what we can to help Taiwan acquire the means to defend itself. Again, that work continues on. But this latest activity — we’ll continue to monitor it and see what happens,” he said.
Austin also expressed confidence that the U.S. military will continue to have the capacity and focus to deter China and work with its allies to promote peace around the Indo-Pacific, even as conflicts around the Middle East and in Ukraine continue to expand.
Additional reporting by Reuters
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