Taiwan ‘at ease’ as China talks up nearby military exercises Drug cartel boss gets 43 years in US prison

CHINA: China says it will hold live-fire military exercises in the Taiwan Strait, amid heightened tensions over increased American support for Taiwan’s government.

The announcement yesterday coincided with President Xi Jinping speaking on the importance of Chinese naval power while attending a massive fleet review in the South China Sea off the coast of Hainan province.

‘‘The mission of building a mighty people’s navy has never been more urgent than it is today,’’ Xi, dressed in army fatigues, said in remarks on the helicopter deck of one of China’s most advanced destroyers.

‘‘Strive to make the people’s navy a first-rate world navy.’’

State media said the fleet review included 48 ships, among them China’s sole operating aircraft carrier, Liaoning, along with 76 helicopters, fighter jets and bombers, and more than 10,000 personnel, making it the largest since the founding of the People’s Republic of China in 1949.

Taiwan’s defence ministry responded with a statement saying the exercises appeared to be part of scheduled annual drills, and that it was closely monitoring the situation and was fully capable of responding. ‘‘Citizens, please feel at ease,’’ the statement said.

While Beijing responded mildly to United States President Donald Trump’s early outreach to Taiwan’s independence-leaning government, recent developments have prompted a tougher response. China claims Taiwan as its own territory and says the sides, which separated during the Chinese civil war in 1949, must eventually be united, by force if necessary.

Despite a lack of formal ties, Washington is legally bound to respond to threats to Taiwan and is the island’s main supplier of foreign military hardware.

Chinese officials have denounced the recent passage of a US law encouraging more high-level contacts with Taiwan. China says the Taiwan Travel Act violates US commitments not to restore formal exchanges severed when Washington switched diplomatic recognition from Taipei to Beijing in 1979. UNITED STATES: A Mexican drug cartel leader whose arrest led to the torture and killings of 12 Mexican police officers has been sentenced in the US to 43 years in prison on drug charges, according to investigators.

Arnoldo Rueda-Medina was sentenced in Dallas. Rueda-Medina was also ordered to pay a US$5 million (NZ$6.7m) fine. The cartel is responsible for smuggling thousands of kilograms of methamphetamine into the US and stashing it in Texas and other locations.

Rueda-Medina, 48, was arrested in Mexico in 2009 and extradited to the US in 2017. Following his arrest, cartel operatives attacked the police station where he was being held with grenades and high-powered rifles. They also ambushed other government facilities and kidnapped the 12 officers in retaliation.

The officers’ bodies were bound and dumped on a mountain road. A piece of cardboard was left at the scene with a scribbled message: ‘‘Come for another. We are waiting for you.’’