China says Taiwan encirclement drills a ‘serious warning’
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Recent Chinese air and sea drills simulating an encirclement of Taiwan were intended as a “serious warning” to pro-independence politicians on the self-governing island and their foreign supporters, a Chinese spokesperson said on April 12.
The three days of large-scale air and sea exercises named Joint Sword that ended on Monday were a response to Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen’s meeting with U.S. House Speaker Kevin McCarthy in California last week during a transit visit to the U.S. China had warned of serious consequences if that meeting went ahead.
“The People’s Liberation Army recently organised and conducted a series of countermeasures in the Taiwan Strait and surrounding waters, which is a serious warning against the collusion and provocation of Taiwan independence separatist forces and external forces,” Zhu Fenglian, a spokesperson for the Cabinet’s Taiwan Affairs Office, said at a biweekly news conference.
Such missions have grown more frequent in recent years, accompanied by increasingly bellicose language from the administration of Communist Party leader Xi Jinping. Any conflict between the sides could draw in the U.S., Taiwan’s closest ally, which is required by law to consider all threats to the island as matters of “grave concern”.
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