China to start new drills near South Korea as US accuses Beijing of destabilising peace

China on Sunday, August 7, announced a new round of live-fire military exercises on the Yellow and Bohai seas in the vicinity to South Korea. The exercises, in a show of defiance and military, might against Taiwan and its ally the US, will be conducted between August 8 to September 8, Beijing's Maritime Safety Administration said in a statement, adding that an additional war exercise will take place on the Yellow Sea between August 7 to 15. 

Beijing has held a long-range live fire drill encircling Taiwan, simulating an all-out attack near Taiwan earlier this week after registering a strong objection to US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's controversial visit to the self-ruled island. Taiwan is considered a "breakaway province" by PRC that it desires to take by force having administered it since 1949. China aims to reunify the island and has warned countermeasures against Washington and its allies for propelling the democracy agenda on the island. 

US warns China trying to 'change the status quo'

White House, in a separate statement, expressed concerns saying that China is trying to “change the status quo” through its military drills around Taiwan. "These [military] activities are a significant escalation in China’s efforts to change the status quo. They are provocative, irresponsible, and raise the risk of miscalculation,” a US spokesperson said, according to the Guardian newspaper. "They are also at odds with our longstanding goal of maintaining peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait, which is what the world expects," the official added. 

In order to retaliate against Beijing People's Liberation Army (PLA)'s military escalation and live fire launches that overlapped the 12 nautical miles of Taiwanese sovereign waters, Taiwan’s official Central News Agency reported that Taiwan’s army will also conduct artillery drills in southern Pingtung County on Tuesday and Thursday the next week. The Chinese military, on the other hand, declared on the state tv that it will begin to conduct “regular” drills on the eastern side of the median line of the Taiwan Strait. Taiwan’s mainland affairs council (MAC) meanwhile accused the Chinese military of destabilizing the region, as it called on the PRC to “exercise restraint and immediately stop all of its belligerent behaviours”. MAC asserted that China must immediately halt encircling Taiwan “as part of a simulation for an attack and a blockade in order to intimidate Taiwan and neighbouring countries”.