TAIPEI, Jan 26 (Reuters) – Taiwan is monitoring what it called “abnormal” changes to China’s military leadership after its most senior general was put under investigation, and will use various methods to decipher Beijing’s intentions, Defence Minister Wellington Koo said on Monday.
China announced on Saturday that Zhang Youxia, second-in-command under President Xi Jinping as vice-chairman of the Central Military Commission, and another senior officer, Liu Zhenli, were under investigation for suspected serious violations of discipline and law.
“We will continue to closely monitor abnormal changes among the top levels of China’s party, government, and military leadership. The military’s position is based on the fact that China has never abandoned the use of force against Taiwan,” Koo told reporters at parliament.
Zhang has long been seen as Xi’s closest military ally, and is one of the few senior Chinese officers with combat experience, having taken part in the 1979 border conflict with Vietnam.
China, which views democratically governed Taiwan as its own territory, sends warplanes and warships into the skies and waters around the island on an almost daily basis, in what Taipei views as a harassment campaign to get the government to accept Beijing’s sovereignty claims.
Koo said what the ministry was looking at is not any “single leadership reshuffle that would be enough to draw conclusions”.
Taiwan will use a range of joint intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance methods, as well as intelligence-sharing, to “grasp” China’s possible intentions, he added.
“What we want is a comprehensive grasp of all indicators – military and non-military – reflecting China’s intentions and actions, and then make an integrated overall assessment,” Koo said, without elaborating.
China has never renounced the use of force to bring Taiwan under its control, and held its latest round of war games around the island late last month. Taiwan’s government says only the island’s people can decide their future.
(Reporting by Ben Blanchard; Editing by Michael Perry)
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