China holds ‘shooting’ drills off Taiwan’s coast, vows ‘reunification’ push

TAIPEI/BEIJING – China’s military held “shooting training” on Feb 26 off Taiwan’s south-west coast in a move Taipei described as provocative and dangerous, while a senior Chinese leader vowed unswerving efforts to bring the island under Beijing’s control.

Democratically governed Taiwan, which China views as its own territory, has repeatedly complained of Chinese military activities, including several rounds of full-scale war games over the past three years.

Taiwan’s Defence Ministry said in a statement that from shortly before 9am, it had detected 32 Chinese military aircraft carrying out a “joint combat readiness drill” with Chinese warships in the Taiwan Strait area.

“During this period, it even blatantly violated international practice by setting up a drills area in waters about 40 nautical miles off the coast... without prior warning, claiming that it would carry out ‘shooting training’,” it added.

Taiwan’s major south-western population centres of Kaohsiung and Pingtung that figured in the ministry’s statement are both home to important naval and air bases.

The exercises endanger the safety of international flights and shipping and are a “blatant provocation” to regional peace and stability, the ministry said, adding that it had dispatched its own forces to keep watch.

There was no immediate confirmation from China that it was carrying out new drills around Taiwan and the Chinese Defence Ministry did not respond to a request for comment.

China’s other recent military activity in the region, such as that off Australia’s coast, gave “proof that China is the only, and the greatest, threat to peace and stability in the Taiwan Strait and the Indo-Pacific”, Taiwan’s ministry said.

China has never renounced the use of force to bring Taiwan under its rule, and has denounced both President Lai Ching-te, who

took office in 2024,

as a “separatist”, and the US for its support for Taiwan.

Earlier on Feb 26, China’s official Xinhua news agency said the ruling Communist Party’s fourth-ranked leader Wang Huning had called this week for greater effort in the cause of Chinese reunification.

China must “firmly grasp the right to dominate and take the initiative in cross-strait relations, and unswervingly push forward the cause of reunification of the motherland”, it quoted Mr Wang as telling an annual meeting on work related to Taiwan.

Taiwan’s government rejects Beijing’s sovereignty claims, saying only the island’s people can decide their future.

Severed undersea cables

Taiwan and China have traded barbs this week over the severing of an undersea communications cable off the island’s south-west coast.

Taiwan on Feb 25 detained a Chinese-linked cargo ship, flagged in Togo, suspected of involvement, though China’s government said Taiwan was “manipulating” possible Chinese involvement, saying the island was casting aspersions before the facts were clear.

Before being detained by Taiwan’s coast guard, the Chinese-crewed Hong Tai 58 was already on a monitoring list of 52 China-linked vessels that Taiwanese security agencies suspect pose a threat to cables because of their past activities near Taiwan, two Taiwanese officials familiar with the matter told Reuters.

This is the fifth case of sea cable malfunctions this year for Taiwan. It reported three cases each in 2024 and 2023.

Taiwan has pointed to similarities between what it has experienced and damage to undersea cables in the Baltic Sea after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. REUTERS