Taiwan president attends navy drill off east coast amid tensions with China

13 Apr, 2018 08:32 / Updated 6 years ago

Taiwan President Tsai Ing-wen on Friday presided over a military drill by the self-ruled island’s navy for the first time since she took office in 2016. The exercise, which involved no live fire, came days after China’s Navy held its largest-ever military display. Beijing also announced plans to hold live-fire military drills in the Taiwan Strait on Wednesday. Tsai boarded a warship off Suao on Taiwan’s east coast to observe the drill, which is aimed to test the military’s rapid response capability to defend Taiwan, Reuters reports. “I believe our nationals should feel very confident about our army’s determination to defend and protect our country,” Tsai, who is chief commander of Taiwan’s armed forces, said aboard the warship after the drill.