China’s military conducted a live-fire exercise in the Taiwan Strait to simulate strikes on key ports and energy facilities, it said on Wednesday.
The exercise, codenamed “Strait Thunder”, is an escalation of military drills China held on Tuesday around Taiwan, the democratic island Beijing claims as its territory.
Taiwan’s presidential office said on Tuesday that it “strongly condemns” the “military provocations”, which have become increasingly routine amid souring cross-strait ties.
The drills come as China sharpened its rhetoric against Taiwan’s President Lai Ching-te, labelling him a “parasite” and “separatist”. Lai had earlier this month referred to China as a “foreign hostile force”. The drills were meant to be a “serious warning and powerful containment of ‘Taiwan independence’ separatist forces”, said a statement from China’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA).
It also released a series of cartoons depicting Lai as a “parasite” that was “poisoning Taiwan island” and – along with an image of Lai being grilled over a fire – “courting ultimate destruction”.
Another video by the PLA, titled “Subdue demons and vanquish evils”, likened the military’s capabilities to the magical powers of the Monkey King, a mythical Chinese character.
In recent days, the Chinese Communist Party newspaper People’s Daily published a series of op-eds denouncing Lai as a “troublemaker” and “warmonger”.
“Facts have fully proven that Lai Ching-te is a vicious war maker,” read one of the articles published on Wednesday. “Subdue demons and vanquish evils, use force to stop war.”
While the trigger for this week’s drills were not spelled out, Chinese authorities and state media have referenced a slew of policies announced by Lai last month to counter influence and infiltration operations by Beijing – where Lai used the “foreign hostile force” term.
Credit: bbc.com
