China begins second day of military exercises around Taiwan

China's military carried out a second day of war games around Taiwan on Friday, with drills to test their ability to "seize power" and control key areas, exercises it has said were launched to punish Taiwan's President Lai Ching-te.

The two days of drills in the Taiwan Strait and around groups of Taiwan-controlled islands near the Chinese coast started just three days after Lai took office. Taiwan has condemned China's actions.

China, which views democratically governed Taiwan as its own territory and denounces Lai as a "separatist", decried his inauguration speech on Monday, in which he urged Beijing to stop its threats and said the two sides of the strait were "not subordinate to each other."

The Eastern Theatre Command of the People's Liberation Army said in a brief statement that its forces on Friday continued with their drills, dubbed "Joint Sword - 2024A".

The exercises are to "test the ability to jointly seize power, launch joint attacks, and occupy key areas", it said.

China has never ruled out the use of force to bring Taiwan under its control.

The command showed an animated video on Friday on its WeChat social media account of missiles being launched at Taiwan from the ground, air, and sea, which then slam into the cities of Taipei, Kaohsiung, and Hualien in balls of flame.

"Sacred weapons to kill independence," read words in red, written in the traditional Chinese characters Taiwan uses, at the end of animation.

Taiwan's armed forces have mobilized to monitor and shadow Chinese forces.

Taiwan's defense ministry on Friday published pictures of F-16s, armed with live missiles, patrolling the skies.

It also showed pictures of Chinese coast guard vessels, which are taking part in the drills, and Chinese Jiangdao-class corvettes, though it did not say exactly where the images were taken.

The ministry said that as of 6 am (2200GMT) on Friday, it had detected 49 Chinese military aircraft, 19 Navy and seven Coast Guard ships. Of the aircraft, 28 crossed the strait's median line, which once served as an unofficial barrier though China says it does not recognize it.

The closest Chinese aircraft got to Taiwan's coast was 40 nautical miles (74 km) from the northern city, and navy base, of Keelung, according to a map the ministry provided.

Reuters