The Taiwan millitary have held another round of their recently announced live-fire security drills on Thursday after their Chinese counterparts had its largest-ever military exercises around the secessionist island and also openly repeated some of their threats to bring the self-ruled democracy under its control.
Beijing had been enraged by United States House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s trip to Taiwan last week which would also make her the highest-ranking elected American official to visit the country in decades.This had resulted in the staging days of air and sea drills that raised tensions to their highest level in years.
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Taiwan had also openly made some accusations on China for using the Pelosi visit as an excuse to kickstart drills that would allow it to rehearse for an invasion.
Lou Woei-jye, spokesman for Taiwan’s Eighth Army Corps, told AFP its forces fired howitzers and target flares as part of the defensive drill on Thursday.
‘The exercise in Taiwan’s southernmost county Pingtung began at 08:30 am (0030 GMT) and lasted about an hour’, he said.
Artillery tucked in from the coast was lined up side by side, with armed soldiers in units firing the howitzers out to sea one after the other, a live stream showed.
Taiwan held a similar drill on Tuesday in Pingtung. Both involved hundreds of troops, the military said. The military has played down the exercises’ significance, saying they were already scheduled and were not in response to China’s war games.
“We have two goals for the drills, the first is to certify the proper condition of the artillery and their maintenance condition and the second is to confirm the results of last year,” Lou said, referring to annual drills. Taiwan routinely stages military drills simulating defence against a Chinese invasion.
Taiwan’s president Tsai Ing-wen thanked troops in a visit to an air force command headquarters on Thursday.
“Right now, China’s military threat has not lessened,” she said in a statement posted on her Facebook page.
“I will reiterate, we will not escalate the conflict or cause disputes, we will firmly defend our sovereignty and national security, and defend the front line of democracy and freedom.”
Taiwan’s latest exercise came after China’s military indicated its own drills had come to an end Wednesday, saying its forces “successfully completed various tasks” in the Taiwan Strait while vowing to continue patrolling its waters.
But in the same announcement, China said that it would “continue to carry out military training and prepare for war”.