China’s maritime mobilization around the island, 53 aircraft and 11 warships detected
China will not allow “Taiwan’s separatist forces to go out of control with external forces” and “will never adopt the ‘wait and see’ approach”: the spokesperson of the government’s Taiwan Affairs Office said Chinese Zhu Fenglian, amid Beijing’s largest maritime mobilization around the island since 1996.
Zhu cited the refusal of the Mainland Affairs Council, Taipei’s counterpart agency, to lift the ban on group tours from China as a move that “further exposes the nature” of the authorities of Taiwan’s ruling Democratic Progressive Party, ” to seek discussion and independence”.
Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Mao Ning, speaking during the daily briefing, underlined in turn that “damaging the peace and stability of the Taiwan Strait is the work of Taiwan’s separatist independence forces, with the support of external actors”.
Meanwhile, Taiwan’s Ministry of Defense reported that it had detected 53 Chinese aircraft and 11 warships, plus eight official boats, active around the island over a 24-hour period at 6am local time (11pm Tuesday in Italy). This is the highest number of planes detected in a single day since the record high of 153 reported on October 15, in large-scale Chinese military maneuvers in response to a speech by Taiwanese President William Lai given a few days earlier. On Tuesday, however, the toll was 47 planes and 12 warships.
