Taiwan again reports Chinese carrier group in Taiwan Strait as election looms

11/12/2023 19:12

        Taiwan's military sent forces to watch a Chinese naval formation, led by the aircraft carrier Shandong, sailing through the Taiwan Strait on Monday, Taiwan's defence ministry said, as Beijing keeps up pressure ahead of elections next month.
        
        The Shandong, commissioned in 2019, last transited the sensitive strait in early November. The latest sailing comes about one month before presidential and parliamentary elections on the island.
        
        The ministry said in a statement that the formation sailed south through the strait but kept to the western side of the waterway's median line - the Chinese side of the unofficial barrier between the two.
        
        China says the Taiwan Strait is not an international waterway and that it alone has sovereignty there, which both Taiwan and the United States dispute.
        
        Taiwan dispatched "appropriate" forces to keep watch on the formation, the ministry added, without elaborating.