Beijing responded to the speech on Thursday by saying it contained lies, Xinhua, the state news agency, reported.
“Lai Ching-te’s speech was filled with lies and nonsense, hostility and malice,” it quoted Chen Binhua, Beijing’s Taiwan Affairs Office spokesman, as saying.
China’s latest military exercise was the sixth major round of manoeuvres since 2022 when a visit to Taiwan by Nancy Pelosi, then the US House Speaker, enraged Beijing.
Taiwan has responded to the growing pressure by increasing defence spending on smaller and more nimble weaponry to enable its military to wage asymmetric warfare against more powerful Chinese forces.
It is under US pressure to do more. Mr Lai’s government aims to boost its 2026 defence budget to more than 3 per cent of gross domestic product and increase spending to 5 per cent of GDP by 2030.
