Taipei, Feb 2 (IANS) Chinese military aircraft incursions near Taiwan have increased nearly 15-fold over the past five years, local media reported citing a report from the Department of China Affairs of Taiwan's ruling party Democratic Progressive Party’s (DPP) .

According to the report, sorties in the Taiwan Strait were not entering regularly previously, with 380 in 2020. The report revealed that the sorties have now started routine operations in the Taiwan Strait, leading daily Taipei Times reported.

It stated, "This demonstrates that the Taiwan Strait has become both the starting point and testing ground for Beijing’s expansionist ambitions." The department report stated that China is systematically taking actions aimed to alter the regional "status quo", adding that Taiwan is the most critical link in China's military strategy.

The rise in Chinese military incursions have been consistent and steep, according to the report. Sorties in the Taiwan Strait increased from 380 in 2020 to 960 in 2021, 1,738 in 2022, 4,734 in 2023, 5,107 in 2024 and 5,709 in 2025.

It stated, "The scale and tempo of the operations clearly show that the Taiwan Strait has become the core theatre of China’s gray zone activities, used to test deterrence, drain Taiwan’s defensive resources and gradually push outward existing security boundaries."

According to the report, frequent military drills enable Beijing to translate its ambitions into placing pressure against Taiwan. It mentioned about China's large-scale exercises which were held in 2025, involving joint operations, sea and air blockades and precision strikes.

The report stated that exercise zones in China's drills in 2025 including the 'Strait Thunder-2025A' exercises in April and the 'Justice Mission 2025' drills in December repeatedly approached Taiwan’s 12-nautical-mile (22.2km) territorial sea and airspace baselines. The Department stated, "Such actions pose a serious threat to peace in the Indo-Pacific region," adding that China’s strategic objectives extend beyond Taiwan, Taipei Times reported.

According to the report, China is advancing high-intensity military and quasi-military operations in areas, including the Diaoyutai Islands, the Sea of Japan, the Yellow Sea and the South China Sea. The department noted that China's 'Victory Day Parade' on September 3, 2025 sought to showcase ambitions of China's military.

Earlier this month, Taiwan's top intelligence agency accused China of using Chinese IT and marketing firms to create fake news sites, manage accounts, and gather and spread misinformation, as part of its cognitive warfare against self-ruled island, local media reported.

The National Security Bureau (NSB) published its findings in an analysis on the People's Republic of China's (PRC) "cognitive warfare tactics against Taiwan in 2025," Taiwan-based Central News Agency (CNA) reported. In 2025, Taiwan's national intelligence gathering team identified more than 45,000 fake social media accounts and over 2.314 million pieces of disinformation being spread using these ways, according to the NSB's report.

It highlighted that this disinformation was spread by fake and/or bot accounts used by Chinese IT firms that have established databases and are creating automated programmes to manage them, under the directive of the PRC's Central Publicity Department and the Ministry of Public Security (MPS).

The Central Publicity Department and the MPS use marketing companies like Haixunshe, Haimai, and Huya to develop fake news websites to spread narratives that support China's official stances. The NSB noted that these websites first attract followers with clickbait soft content and then change their posts to political ones to influence the viewpoint of people of Taiwan.

The NSB further stated that China, by taking these actions, aims to create divisions within Taiwan, weaken the Taiwanese people's will to resist, influence allies' willingness to back Taiwan when required, and gain support among the people of Taiwan for China's gain. The agency stated that it was working with related government units and ramping up efforts to cooperate with fact-checking organisations and social media platform operators, urging them to reveal and take down false information.

--IANS

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