China resumes military drills off Taiwan after shelving US talks

China carried out fresh military drills around Taiwan on Monday, including anti-submarine attack and sea raid operations, a day after its major live-fire exercises targeting the territory were supposed to end.

Taipei condemned Beijing for extending the drills.

The Taiwanese military said it detected 39 Chinese warplanes and 13 ships operating in the strait on Monday.

Of those, 21 aircraft crossed the median line, an unofficial demarcation between China and Taiwan that the former does not recognise.

The US president expressed concern Monday but said he did not expect the situation to escalate further.

The PLA had already announced that China would conduct live-fire exercises in the Yellow Sea from Sunday until 15 August, in five exclusion zones. Taiwan authorities said the areas would not affect its international flight routes.

He said the military had also identified multiple cyberwarfare attacks allegedly from China, and at least 272 attempts to spread disinformation.

Amid the furious responses, China also called off formal talks involving theatre-level commands, defence policy coordination and military maritime consultations on Friday as Pelosi left the region.

Pentagon, state department and White House officials condemned the move, describing it as an irresponsible overreaction.

One US official noted that Chinese officials had not responded to calls from senior Pentagon officials amid the tensions last week, but that they did not see this as a formal severing of ties with senior figures, such as the US defence secretary, Lloyd Austin.

Additional reporting by Vincent Ni