China launched large-scale military exercises around Taiwan and its outlying islands on Monday in a "warning" against the territory's independence, days after Taipei reiterated its sovereignty.
The Chinese Defense Ministry said the exercises were a response to Taiwan leader William Lai's recent assertion that the People's Republic of China "has no right to represent Taiwan."
Taipei called the exercises a provocation and said its forces were prepared to respond.
Chinese People's Liberation Army Eastern Theater Command spokesman Captain Li Xi said the navy, air force and missile corps were all mobilized for the drills.
"This is an important warning to those who support Taiwan independence and a sign of our determination to safeguard our sovereignty," Li said in a statement carried by Beijing's official media.
The drills, called Joint Sword-2024B, involve land, sea and air forces and are similar to those China conducted last May, also in the Taiwan Strait and around the self-governing island.
Li said the exercises include ships and aircraft approaching the island from various directions, as well as joint strikes by different forces, with the aim of testing actual combat readiness.
Taiwan was a Japanese colony before being unified with China at the end of World War II. The two territories have been separated since Chiang Kai-shek's Nationalists fled to the island in 1949, while Mao Zedong's Communists took power on the Chinese mainland at the end of the civil war.
Lai took office in May, continuing an eight-year rule by the Democratic Progressive Party, which rejects China's demand that it recognize Taiwan as a Chinese province.
"The Republic of China [Taiwan's official name] has taken root in Taiwan, Penghu, Kinmen and Matsu. The Republic of China and the People's Republic of China are not subordinate to each other," Lai said to applause during a speech delivered outside the presidential palace in Taipei during National Day celebrations last week.
China has regularly said that Taiwan's independence is a "dead end" and that annexation by Beijing is a historical inevitability.
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