"On Monday and Tuesday, China's People's Liberation Army launched live-fire military drills around Taiwan, simulating a blockade of main ports and sending its navy, air force, rocket force and coastguard to encircle Taiwan's main island. The drills, called Justice Mission 2025, came closer to Taiwan than previous exercises, and involved at least 89 warplanes, the highest tally for more than a year."
"The broadcast of Xi's speech on Chinese state media was interspersed with several shots of China's largest ever military parade, which was held in September to mark 80 years since the end of the second world war. During the parade, which was viewed as an unbridled display of military force, Xi, Putin and North Korea's leader, Kim Jong-un, stood side by side in Beijing a geopolitical alignment that has been called the axis of upheaval."
Xi Jinping vowed to reunify China and Taiwan, calling reunification "a trend of the times" and "unstoppable". China claims Taiwan as part of its territory and has long maintained a readiness to annex it by force if necessary. US intelligence expresses growing concern about advancing PLA capabilities to mount such an attack. The PLA conducted Justice Mission 2025 live-fire drills simulating a blockade of main ports, deploying navy, air, rocket and coastguard forces and at least 89 warplanes, coming closer to Taiwan than prior exercises. The drills were linked to a recent US approval of roughly $11bn in arms sales to Taiwan. Beijing showcased multilateral summits and a large military parade featuring Xi, Putin and Kim Jong-un.
Read at www.theguardian.com
Unable to calculate read time
Collection
[
|
...
]