Name: China Gives Antagonistic Response to President Lai's Inauguration | TaiwanPlus News
Uploaded: 2024-05-03T03:25:19.000Z
Duration: 3 min 12 s
Description: Thousands of YouTube videos with English-Chinese subtitles! Now you can learn to understand native speakers, expand your vocabulary, and improve your pronunciation...

It's no secret that one of Lai's biggest challenges will be dealing with an increasingly hostile China.

And now Lai is officially sworn in. All eyes on how Beijing will react.

Rhys Ayres has been monitoring military activity around the island. Rhys, what's the latest?

Well, Leslie, China's Taiwan Affairs Office has just released a statement on the day of the inauguration of Lai Chingde as Taiwan's new president.

It's safe to say Beijing is not a fan of Lai, accusing him of, I quote, flagrantly promoting separatist fallacies and inciting cross-strait confrontation.

It also said, I quote, Taiwan independence and peace in the Taiwan Strait are as compatible as fire and water.

Now, earlier in his career, Lai was seen as advocating for Taiwanese independence.

That's a line that he's toned down more in recent years and now emphasizes the status quo of Taiwan's de facto sovereignty.

But in terms of a military response from China, Taiwan has seen about six Chinese military aircraft and seven warships in its Air Defense Identification Zone, or ADIZ.

Now, Taiwan doesn't actually own that airspace. It's just more of a defensive buffer against China.

Now, six is actually considered a rather low amount, considering on an almost daily basis we do see Chinese fighter jets in that area.

And China often uses these incursions as kind of scare tactics, particularly during any times of political sensitivity regarding Taiwan.

Now, an example of a much bigger incursion in recent years was actually in 2022, when then U.S.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi paid a visit to Taiwan. She met with then President Tsai Ing-wen.

It was a very controversial trip that Beijing responded to quite angrily.

They also responded by sending almost 50 aircraft into the region and simulating a blockade of sorts with a week of drills around Taiwan.

That was the most activity we've ever seen from China in response to a political event.

Now, regarding the inauguration day incursions, it's important to know that those reports came in at 9 a.m.

Taiwan time on Monday morning, and those reports only refer to the previous 24 hours of incursions.

So unless there's a major incident in the next few hours, we won't really know the full extent of China's military response until the following morning.

Now, going back to Lai Ching-de and his inauguration speech, he talked a lot about cross-strait issues, including about the continued problem of Chinese aggression.

He also said that peace in the strait was of the utmost importance and called on Beijing to stop harassing Taiwan militarily, something it's been doing continuously for years.

He also said that the future of cross-strait relations will have a decisive impact on the world and not just on Taiwan.

But for now, Taiwan continues to watch the skies.

 The full extent of Beijing's response to Lai's inauguration or lack thereof is really yet to be revealed.