TAIPEI, Taiwan — China is continuously bolstering its military bases along the coastline facing Taiwan, the self-ruled island’s Defense Ministry said in a report Tuesday, as Beijing steps up military activities around the territory it claims as its own.
Taiwan said it will continue to monitor the Chinese activities around the island and bolster its defenses in response. Earlier on Tuesday, Taiwan’s Defense Ministry said it had spotted 22 Chinese warplanes and 20 warships near the island over the previous 24 hours — part of military harassment by Beijing, which hasn’t ruled out force to reunite the island with the mainland.
“This year, the Chinese Communist Party has aggressively expanded its armaments and continued to build various types of fighter jets and drones,” Maj. Gen. Huang Wen-Chi, the assistant deputy chief with the General Staff for Intelligence of Taiwan’s Defense Ministry, said during a news conference releasing the biennial report.
“The information we have received is that all important military bases along the coast … are being continuously updated,” he added.
Huang pointed to three military airfields in China’s southeastern Fujian province – Longtian, Huian and Zhangzhou – that have recently been expanded. The closest one to Taiwan, Longtian, is only 217 kilometers (135 miles) from the capital, Taipei.
Over the past year, Beijing has stepped up military activities around Taiwan,…
