China is stepping up its military preparedness to overtake Taiwan, Minister of Foreign Affairs Joseph Wu (吳釗燮) said yesterday, following a spike of Chinese drills near the nation.
Taiwan has said that China has stepped up threatening military activities near the nation in the past few months, while Beijing has not renounced the use of force to unify the nations.
“Looking [at] the long-term trend, China appears to be gradually stepping up its military preparedness, especially in air or on the waters near Taiwan,” Wu told reporters.
Photo courtesy of the Ministry of Defense via CNA
“What China is doing now is continuing to ramp up preparedness to solve the Taiwan issue,” he said. “The threat is on the rise.”
Beijing routinely says that such exercises are not unusual and are designed to show its determination to defend its sovereignty.
The Ministry of Defense last month reported eight incidents in which Chinese military planes entered Taiwan’s air defence identification zone and Taiwanese jets gave radio warnings to usher the intruders out of their airspace.
Wu said that such intrusions “happened almost every day” last month and were “much more frequent” than what the government had disclosed to the public.
China has also made several “simulated” military attacks on Taiwan, he said.
“These behaviors worry us,” Wu said, adding that Taiwan is deepening its security ties with allies, including the US which has no official diplomatic ties with the nation, but is its strongest international backer and main arms supplier.
Attacking Taiwan could be good way for the Chinese government to divert domestic pressure, Wu said, adding that China is struggling with a fast-slowing economy amid the COVID-19 pandemic and a wave of floods.
The Central Weather Administration (CWA) today issued a sea warning for Typhoon Fung-wong effective from 5:30pm, while local governments canceled school and work for tomorrow. A land warning is expected to be issued tomorrow morning before it is expected to make landfall on Wednesday, the agency said. Taoyuan, and well as Yilan, Hualien and Penghu counties canceled work and school for tomorrow, as well as mountainous district of Taipei and New Taipei City. For updated information on closures, please visit the Directorate-General of Personnel Administration Web site. As of 5pm today, Fung-wong was about 490km south-southwest of Oluanpi (鵝鑾鼻), Taiwan's southernmost point.
UNILATERAL MOVES: Officials have raised concerns that Beijing could try to exert economic control over Kinmen in a key development plan next year The Civil Aviation Administration (CAA) yesterday said that China has so far failed to provide any information about a new airport expected to open next year that is less than 10km from a Taiwanese airport, raising flight safety concerns. Xiamen Xiangan International Airport is only about 3km at its closest point from the islands in Kinmen County — the scene of on-off fighting during the Cold War — and construction work can be seen and heard clearly from the Taiwan side. In a written statement sent to Reuters, the CAA said that airports close to each other need detailed advanced
Tropical Storm Fung-Wong would likely strengthen into a typhoon later today as it continues moving westward across the Pacific before heading in Taiwan’s direction next week, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. As of 8am, Fung-Wong was about 2,190km east-southeast of Cape Oluanpi (鵝鑾鼻), Taiwan’s southernmost point, moving westward at 25kph and possibly accelerating to 31kph, CWA data showed. The tropical storm is currently over waters east of the Philippines and still far from Taiwan, CWA forecaster Tseng Chao-cheng (曾昭誠) said, adding that it could likely strengthen into a typhoon later in the day. It is forecast to reach the South China Sea
Almost a quarter of volunteer soldiers who signed up from 2021 to last year have sought early discharge, the Legislative Yuan’s Budget Center said in a report. The report said that 12,884 of 52,674 people who volunteered in the period had sought an early exit from the military, returning NT$895.96 million (US$28.86 million) to the government. In 2021, there was a 105.34 percent rise in the volunteer recruitment rate, but the number has steadily declined since then, missing recruitment targets, the Chinese-language United Daily News said, citing the report. In 2021, only 521 volunteers dropped out of the military, the report said, citing
RSS