Shandong aircraft carrier sent by China to Taiwan’s waters

Beijing, April 10 – The People’s Liberation Army’s Eastern Combat Command region said in a statement that the aircraft carrier of the Chinese Navy of the People’s Liberation Army is taking part in military exercises around the island of Taiwan.

As stated in a statement released on Monday on the ministry’s official WeChat social network account, the command troops are still around the island of Taiwan as part of the exercises. In the exercises on Monday, as noted, for the first time the aircraft carrier “Shandong” is participating. Command forces are practicing joint maneuvers to surround and contain the island.

The Shandong is the second aircraft carrier in service with China and the first built by China. The aircraft carrier is 315 meters long, 75 meters wide, weighs 70,000 tons, and has a speed of 31 knots. Chinese media reported that 36 Jian-15 (J-15) fighters could be on board. The aircraft carrier has been under construction since 2013, it was launched in April 2017, the first test flight took place from May 13 to 18, 2019, and on November 17, 2019 it was transferred to the Navy of the People’s Liberation Army of China. .

The Chinese armed forces are carrying out maneuvers and patrols in the sea and the area around Taiwan from April 8 to 10 according to the combat training plan, said Shi Yi, spokesman for the Eastern Combat Command Area of ​​the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) Saturday. He said the exercise is a warning to the pro-Taiwan independence forces, and is a necessary measure to safeguard China’s sovereignty and territorial integrity.

On Sunday, the Taiwan Armed Forces detected 70 aircraft of the Chinese People’s Liberation Army approaching the island, and 35 aircraft crossed the so-called center line of the Taiwan Strait and entered the Taiwan Air Defense Identification Zone. The island’s defense ministry also announced that 11 ships belonging to the People’s Liberation Army were approaching Taiwan.

The situation around Taiwan escalated dramatically after a visit to the island in early August last year by then-Speaker of the US House of Representatives Nancy Pelosi. China, which considers the island one of its provinces, condemned Pelosi’s visit, seeing in this move the United States’ support for Taiwanese separatism, and conducted large-scale military exercises.

Official relations between the central government of the People’s Republic of China and its island province ceased in 1949 after Chiang Kai-shek’s KMT forces were defeated in a civil war with the Chinese Communist Party, and moved to Taiwan. Commercial and informal contacts between the island and mainland China resumed in the late 1980s. Since the early 1990s, the parties have started contacting through NGOs – the Beijing Association for the Development of Relationships Across the Taiwan Straits and the Taipei Foundation for Cross-Strait Exchanges.