The truce was only short-lived.
Despite calls from Westerners and Japan, China announced on Monday August 8 the continuation of military exercises near Taiwan, still in response to the visit of the number three American Nancy Pelosi on this island claimed by Beijing.
The day after the departure of the Speaker of the House of Representatives, the Chinese army launched Thursday vast "real fire" maneuvers in six large areas all around Taiwan.
These exercises, at least in this configuration, were to end Sunday noon (4:00 GMT) according to the Chinese maritime security administration.
They were intended to practice a "blockade" of the island, according to official Chinese media.
They had drawn criticism from the heads of the G7 diplomacy (United States, Japan, France, Germany, Italy, Canada, United Kingdom), who had considered that there was "no justification" for these military maneuvers "aggressive".
Antony Blinken had described the Chinese reaction as "total disproportion".
With his Japanese and Australian counterparts, the American secretary of state had also published a press release calling on China to stop its military exercises.
Blur around these new maneuvers
"The People's Liberation Army (...) continues to conduct practical joint exercises in the sea and air space around Taiwan, focusing on joint anti-submarine and sea assault operations," the Chinese Army's Eastern Theater Command said in a statement.
He did not specify in which areas these maneuvers take place, or whether they are "live fire" or not.
The Chinese army has conducted in recent days around Taiwan the largest military exercises in its history in this area, sending fighter jets, warships, drones and firing ballistic missiles.
To prove how close it had come to the Taiwanese coast, the Chinese army released this weekend a photo it said it took from one of its warships, where we see a Taiwanese navy building in only a few hundred meters.
This shot may be the closest to the Taiwanese coastline ever taken by mainland Chinese forces.
These maneuvers have in particular made it possible to "perfect and improve the capabilities of destroying strategic island targets with precision strikes", said an officer of the Chinese air force, Zhang Zhi, quoted by the new China news agency.
China considers Taiwan, an island with a population of around 23 million, to be one of its provinces, which it has yet to successfully reunify with the rest of its territory since the end of the civil war. Chinese (1949).
Opposed to any initiative giving the Taiwanese authorities international legitimacy, Beijing is against any official contact between Taiwan and other countries.
With AFP
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