“These provocations, pressure, fantasies and over-exaggerations will not prevent the normal drills of the Chinese military,” the Communist Party’s People’s Daily said on Sunday, as reported by Reuters.
According to the paper, no amount of “word bombs,” such as remarks by US President Donald Trump’s secretary of state pick, Rex Tillerson, could interfere with Chinese military exercises.
“The meddling and disruption of countries from outside the region can only run counter to the consensus of common interests that accords with this region and the world… Henceforth, the Chinese military’s exercises far out at sea will become a kind of normal, extremely normal drills.”
Earlier, Rex Tillerson said that Beijing should be denied access to islands it has built in the disputed South China Sea.
“We’re going to have to send China a clear signal that, first, the island-building stops and, second, your access to those islands also is not going to be allowed,” the former ExxonMobil CEO said. It would be a threat to the “entire global economy” if Beijing were able to dictate access to the waterway, he added.
In early January, China confirmed that its navy, headed by the aircraft carrier Liaoning, was conducting exercises in the South China Sea to test weapons and equipment, as well as carrying out “scientific research.
