China military drills on; Taiwan nervous

BEIJING: China has kicked off a two-and-a-half month series of military exercises on the northern coast near Taiwan.

The drills are more likely to be a regular period of internal training aimed at boosting the combat ability of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) and putting its advanced air defense weapons to the test, rather than targeting the island of Taiwan, as some reports by Taiwan media have suggested, analysts said.