CHINA CARRIES OUT AIRCRAFT CARRIER DRILLS IN PACIFIC AMID TAIWAN TENSIONS

BEIJING : China has carried out aircraft carrier drills in the Pacific, its navy said on Saturday, ramping up tensions with Taiwan over its military exercises in the sensitive region. Beijing’s sole aircraft carrier and two destroyer ships carried out “offensive and defensive drills to test their combat muscle” on Friday, China’s navy said on its official microblog site on Weibo. The exercises took place in an area east of the Bashi Channel, which runs between Taiwan and the Philippines, it said. China sees democratically-governed Taiwan as a renegade part of its territory to be brought back into the fold and has not ruled out reunification by force. In Beijing’s latest military drills, photos showed J-15 fighters waiting to take off from a Liaoning aircraft carrier.