<div style="text-align: justify; "><span style="font-size: 1rem;"><b>As Beijing’s ships and warplanes encircled Taiwan today, television anchors on the self-ruled island focused instead on a store razed by fire, a proposed ban on ambulance sirens, and a restaurant scandal involving an influencer.</b></span><br></div><div style="text-align: justify; "><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Coverage of these hyper-local news stories eclipsed that of China’s military drills, launched in response to what Beijing’s military called “separatist acts of ‘Taiwan independence’ forces”.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">The exercises come as a “punishment” three days after the island swore in President Lai Ching-te, who China regards as a “dangerous separatist”.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Popular news channel TVBS reported on the drills, but flicked quickly back to breaking news of truck drivers for an online retail service complaining about “sweat-shop” conditions.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Democratic Taiwan is accustomed to frequent threats from China, which claims the island as part of its territory.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Beijing has said it will never renounce the use of force to bring Taiwan under its control, and has in recent years upped the rhetoric of “unification” being “inevitable”.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">But Taiwan has its own government, military and currency, as well as a population of 23 million that increasingly considers its identity distinct from that of the Chinese.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">“Basically they want reunification, which means they (China) want to devour us (Taiwan). This is simple,” said Hung, a 65-year-old taxi driver in Taipei, who scoffed at the drills.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">“They are just raising a fuss. They won’t really stage a war,” he said.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">“If they really want to stage a war, it would be missiles that are flying over,” he said, adding that the drills were expected given that Lai is a member of the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), which has championed Taiwan’s sovereignty. - AFP&nbsp;</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify; ">bnbd/fas</div>