BEIJING: China’s military on Wednesday (Apr 2) launched military exercises code-named “Strait Thunder-2025A” in the middle and southern areas of the Taiwan Strait, continuing drills begun the previous day.
The exercises follow a rise in Chinese rhetoric against Taiwan President Lai Ching-te, who China called a “parasite” on Tuesday, and come on the heels of US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s Asia visit, during which he repeatedly criticised Beijing.
China, which views democratically governed Taiwan as its own territory, has repeatedly denounced Lai as a “separatist”. Lai, who won the election and took office last year, rejects Beijing’s sovereignty claims and says only Taiwan’s people can decide their future.
China’s Eastern Theatre Command said the drills were taking place in the middle and southern areas of the Taiwan Strait. Some of Taiwan’s outlying islands are just a few kilometres from China.
“The exercises focus on subjects of identification and verification, warning and expulsion, and interception and detention so as to test the troops’ capabilities of area regulation and control, joint blockade and control, and precision strikes on key targets,” it said in a statement.
Taiwan has denounced China for holding the drills, but has said it has seen no sign of live-fire exercises so far.
A senior Taiwan security official told Reuters there were more than 10 Chinese warships in Taiwan’s “response zone” on Wednesday morning, and that China’s coast guard was participating with “harassment” drills.
Taiwan’s defence ministry said that in the previous 24 hours it had detected 76 Chinese military aircraft and 15 Chinese military ships operating around the island.
China had not formally named Tuesday’s drills. China called two rounds of major war games last year around the island Joint Sword-2024A and Joint Sword-2024B.
China’s widely read Global Times, published by the ruling Communist Party’s official People’s Daily, said advanced equipment had been used, pointing to pictures from the military showing YJ-21 air-launched ballistic missiles slung under H-6K bombers.
Previous Chinese war games have also practiced precision strikes and blockading the island.
The United States, Taiwan’s most important international backer and main arms supplier despite the lack of formal diplomatic ties, condemned the exercises.
“Once again, China’s aggressive military activities and rhetoric toward Taiwan only serve to exacerbate tensions and put the region’s security and the world’s prosperity at risk,” the US State Department said in a statement.
Japan and the European Union also expressed concern.
“The EU has a direct interest in the preservation of the status quo in the Taiwan Strait. We oppose any unilateral actions that change the status quo by force or coercion,” an EU spokesperson said
Taiwan’s financial markets on Wednesday continued to shrug off the drills, with the benchmark index rising around 0.4 per cent.
https://www.channelnewsasia.com/east-asia/china-drills-around-taiwan-continue-code-name-strait-thunder-5038751
