The Ministry of National Defense yesterday said it was closely monitoring the movements of the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) near Taiwan, after the Chinese aircraft carrier Liaoning was spotted in waters off Taiwan, amid reports of potential upcoming military drills.
Colonel Hu Chung-hua (胡中華), an intelligence officer at the ministry’s Office of Deputy Chief of General Staff for Intelligence, said the Liaoning was in the waters off Taiwan proper’s southeast coast, but did not reveal how close the aircraft carrier was.
The armed forces are closely monitoring the situation with joint intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance systems, and have deployed forces in response — regardless of whether the PLA plans to launch new military drills, he said.
Photo: Reuters
The ministry “anticipates the enemy as broadly as possible and defends against the enemy strictly. We also carefully evaluate and act accordingly,” Hu said.
Colonel Su Tung-wei (蘇統偉), deputy head of the ministry’s General Staff Operations and Planning Department, said the armed forces were constantly evaluating threat levels posed by the PLA to consider whether to “activate a response center, or to increase our defense readiness to perform an immediate readiness drill.”
“We will also react accordingly to safeguard national security,” Su said.
The two senior officials made the remarks at a regular news conference at the ministry, in response to a question about reports that the PLA could soon launch military exercises near Taiwan, with the Liaoning approaching the country.
Multiple local news outlets on Tuesday reported that the Liaoning was heading to the western Pacific east of Taiwan and could conduct military exercises there later this week during the Dragon Boat Festival holiday from tomorrow to Sunday.
In addition, the ministry said that 41 PLA aircraft and vessels were detected around Taiwan between 6am on Tuesday and 6am yesterday.
Among them, 22 Chinese naval vessels were detected crossing the median line of the Taiwan Strait during this period, it said.
While China sends military aircraft, ships and spy balloons near Taiwan as part of a campaign of daily harassment, special attention has been given this week to the location of the Liaoning, China’s first aircraft carrier, the hull of which was bought from Ukraine and then fitted out by China more than a decade ago.
China has two aircraft carriers including the Liaoning, with a third undergoing sea trials and a fourth under construction.
The Japanese Ministry of Defense on Sunday announced that the Liaoning was spotted in the East China Sea near the Diaoyutai Islands (釣魚台) — known as the Senkaku Islands in Japan — conducting fighter jet takeoff and landing drills from the carrier.
It was the first time Japan had detected takeoffs and landings of fighter jets from a Chinese aircraft carrier sailing in the East China Sea, the Japanese ministry said.
In Beijing, asked during a regular news conference why the Chinese aircraft carrier was so close to Japan and whether China was sending a signal to Taiwan, Japan and the US, Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokeswoman Mao Ning (毛寧) said: “What I can tell you is that the activities of the Chinese warship in the relevant waters are fully in line with international law and the basic norms of international relations.”
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