China’s military flew 38 fighter jets and other warplanes near Taiwan, the Taiwanese Defense Ministry said on April 28, in the largest such flight display since the large military exercise in which it simulated sealing off the island earlier in the month.
Six navy vessels were also spotted in the area from 6 a.m. on April 27 to 6 a.m. on April 28, as part of China’s long-running campaign of intimidation against the self-ruled island democracy that Beijing claims as part of its territory.
Taiwan and China split in 1949 following a civil war that ended with the Communist Party in control of the mainland. The island has never been part of the People’s Republic of China, but Beijing says it must unite with the mainland, by force if necessary.
19 of the Chinese aircraft flew across the midline in the Taiwan Strait that separates the island from the mainland, the ministry said. It said they included five SU-30 and two J-16 aircraft. One drone, a TB-001 flew around Taiwan, first crossing the Bashi Channel that separates Taiwan from the Philippines, then up the east of Taiwan before crossing back toward the Chinese coast according to a diagram from the Defense Ministry.
A new type of Chinese combat drone that China’s state media says can carry a heavy weapons payload has flown around Taiwan, the island’s defense ministry said on April 27, in the latest uptick in military tensions.
China held exercises simulating the sealing off the island after the sensitive meeting April 5 between Taiwan’s President Tsai Ing-wen and US House Speaker Kevin McCarthy in California.
China opposes any exchanges at the official level between Taiwan and other Governments.
Meanwhile, China said on April 27, that Taiwan was inviting “wolves” into the home by hosting a U.S. defense industry forum recently, and that the U.S. military-industrial complex sought to export war for profit. The US -Taiwan Business Council is, along with the Taiwan External Trade Development Council, hosting the Taiwan-U.S. Defense Industry Forum in Taipei. China was “extremely concerned” to learn of the forum.
The United States is Chinese-claimed Taiwan’s most important arms provider despite the lack of formal diplomatic ties, and the subject is a frequent source of tension between Beijing and Washington.
Chinese military aircraft have since last year regularly crossed the median line of the Taiwan Strait, which normally serves as an unofficial barrier between the two sides, though China says it does not recognise this.
