KINMEN, Taiwan: Taiwanese President Lai Ching-te visited an island off China on Friday for the 75th anniversary of a victory over communist forces, days after China and Taiwan held military drills in sensitive waters separating the two.
Lai’s trip to the Kinmen islands, a few kilometers from the Chinese mainland, follows a fortnight of intense military activity in the Taiwan Strait.
Lai, who took power in May and has been more outspoken than his predecessor in defending Taiwan’s sovereignty, attended a somber ceremony for the Battle of Guningtou and shook hands with veterans.
China’s Communist Party has never ruled democratic Taiwan, but Beijing claims the island as part of its territory and has said it will never renounce the use of force to bring it under its control.
The dispute between Beijing and Taipei dates back to a civil war between Mao Zedong’s communist fighters and Chiang Kai-shek’s nationalist forces, which fled to Taiwan in 1949 following their defeat.
The nationalists scored a key victory over the communists in the Battle of Guningtou on the Kinmen islands, which Taiwan still controls along with the Matsu islands next to China.
China has ramped up military and political pressure on Taiwan in recent years as it seeks to browbeat Taipei into accepting its claims of sovereignty over the islands.
Beijing’s large-scale war games around Taiwan on October 14 were followed by live-fire drills near the island on Tuesday, and the transiting of a Chinese aircraft carrier group through the Taiwan Strait on Wednesday.
Taiwanese troops conducted live-fire drills on Penghu island in the waterway on Thursday, days after a US and a Canadian warship sailed through the narrow passage.
Taiwan president visits island off China for battle anniversary
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Taiwan president visits island off China for battle anniversary
- Lai Ching-te’s trip to the Kinmen islands follows a fortnight of intense military activity in the Taiwan Strait
- China’s Communist Party has never ruled democratic Taiwan, but Beijing claims the island as part of its territory
Russian FM slams ‘brazen’ Western plan to deploy force to Ukraine
- “This is not so much about security as it is about yet another attempt, you know, a brazen one,” Lavrov said
- Moscow has repeatedly railed against the idea of Western troops being deployed to Ukraine
CAIRO: Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov on Friday slammed a European proposal to create a multinational force to police any potential peace deal in Ukraine as a “brazen” threat to Russia.
“This is not so much about security as it is about yet another attempt, you know, a brazen one... to carry out the military development of Ukrainian territory as a springboard for creating threats to the Russian Federation,” Lavrov said, during a visit to Egypt.
Leaders of Kyiv’s key European allies — including Britain, France, Germany and Italy — said this week they were ready to deploy a European-led “multinational force Ukraine” to “assist in the regeneration of Ukraine’s forces, in securing Ukraine’s skies, and in supporting safer seas, including through operating inside Ukraine.”
Moscow has repeatedly railed against the idea of Western troops being deployed to Ukraine, warning that it would consider them “legitimate targets” for Russia’s armed forces.
Ukraine is pushing for strong security guarantees if it signs up to a deal to end the four-year war, including Western military commitments that it sees as necessary to prevent Russia from invading once again.
