Taiwanese will gradually get used to Chinese air force drills that encircle the nation, China said yesterday, while Premier William Lai (賴清德) reiterated the nation’s desire for peaceful relations with Beijing.
China has taken an increasingly hostile stance toward Taiwan since President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文), of the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), last year won the presidential election, and has stepped up its rhetoric and military exercises.
Beijing suspects Tsai of pushing for Taiwanese independence, a red line for China.
Photo courtesy of the Ministry of National Defense
Tsai said she wants peace with China, but also that she would defend Taiwan’s security and way of life.
Chinese state media has given broad coverage to “encirclement” exercises near Taiwan this month, including showing photographs of Chinese bombers with what they said was Taiwan’s highest peak, Yushan (玉山), visible in the background.
Asked about the continuing drill’s and the footage released by the air force, China’s Taiwan Affairs Office said it and the Chinese Ministry of National Defense had repeatedly described the exercises as routine.
“Everyone will slowly get used it,” office spokesman An Fengshan (安峰山) told a routine news briefing, without elaborating.
The Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) has carried out 16 rounds of exercises close to Taiwan in the past year or so, the Taiwanese Ministry of National Defense said in a white paper this week.
China’s military threat was growing by the day, it added.
The government has accused Beijing of not understanding democracy when it criticizes Taipei.
The US, Japan and South Korea are paying close attention to the PLA’s activities, Lai said at an end of year news conference in Taipei.
“Under the president’s leadership, the Executive Yuan pushes forward government affairs, stabilizing cross-strait relations toward peaceful development,” Lai said.
Super Typhoon Kong-rey is the largest cyclone to impact Taiwan in 27 years, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said today. Kong-rey’s radius of maximum wind (RMW) — the distance between the center of a cyclone and its band of strongest winds — has expanded to 320km, CWA forecaster Chang Chun-yao (張竣堯) said. The last time a typhoon of comparable strength with an RMW larger than 300km made landfall in Taiwan was Typhoon Herb in 1996, he said. Herb made landfall between Keelung and Suao (蘇澳) in Yilan County with an RMW of 350km, Chang said. The weather station in Alishan (阿里山) recorded 1.09m of
NO WORK, CLASS: President William Lai urged people in the eastern, southern and northern parts of the country to be on alert, with Typhoon Kong-rey approaching Typhoon Kong-rey is expected to make landfall on Taiwan’s east coast today, with work and classes canceled nationwide. Packing gusts of nearly 300kph, the storm yesterday intensified into a typhoon and was expected to gain even more strength before hitting Taitung County, the US Navy’s Joint Typhoon Warning Center said. The storm is forecast to cross Taiwan’s south, enter the Taiwan Strait and head toward China, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. The CWA labeled the storm a “strong typhoon,” the most powerful on its scale. Up to 1.2m of rainfall was expected in mountainous areas of eastern Taiwan and destructive winds are likely
The Central Weather Administration (CWA) yesterday at 5:30pm issued a sea warning for Typhoon Kong-rey as the storm drew closer to the east coast. As of 8pm yesterday, the storm was 670km southeast of Oluanpi (鵝鑾鼻) and traveling northwest at 12kph to 16kph. It was packing maximum sustained winds of 162kph and gusts of up to 198kph, the CWA said. A land warning might be issued this morning for the storm, which is expected to have the strongest impact on Taiwan from tonight to early Friday morning, the agency said. Orchid Island (Lanyu, 蘭嶼) and Green Island (綠島) canceled classes and work
KONG-REY: A woman was killed in a vehicle hit by a tree, while 205 people were injured as the storm moved across the nation and entered the Taiwan Strait Typhoon Kong-rey slammed into Taiwan yesterday as one of the biggest storms to hit the nation in decades, whipping up 10m waves, triggering floods and claiming at least one life. Kong-rey made landfall in Taitung County’s Chenggong Township (成功) at 1:40pm, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. The typhoon — the first in Taiwan’s history to make landfall after mid-October — was moving north-northwest at 21kph when it hit land, CWA data showed. The fast-moving storm was packing maximum sustained winds of 184kph, with gusts of up to 227kph, CWA data showed. It was the same strength as Typhoon Gaemi, which was the most
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