Mainland Chinese drone user drops leaflets on Taiwanese outlet in ‘anti-independence protest’
- Campaign does not have Beijing’s official support, but there has been no apparent effort to stop it and it echoes previous propaganda campaigns
- Taiwan media describes flights as a ‘new harassment measure from the mainland’ prompting questions about why the drone was not shot down
A mainland Chinese man’s solo drone campaign against Taiwan has been praised by online nationalists for “showing the public’s support for unification”.
The unnamed man started flying drones over the closest Taiwanese outpost to the mainland dropping fliers that attacked independence a day after the People’s Liberation Army finished two days of drills in protest at the inauguration speech of the island’s new leader William Lai Ching-te.
The incident echoes the decades-long propaganda war between the two sides following the Communist victory in the civil war in 1949, which saw balloons carrying pamphlets and food being sent to both sides.
This time there has been no official endorsement from Beijing of the flights, but the mainland has strict rules on drone use and there has been no apparent intervention to stop the man’s activities.
In recent years there have been a string of incidents in which unidentified drones have flown over restricted waters, around Quemoy, also known as Kinmen, which is just a few kilometres off the coast of the Chinese mainland. Two years ago Taiwanese troops shot down a drone in the area.
The man behind the latest campaign has not disclosed his identity, but uses the online alias Twenty Years of Stargazing and says he lives in Xiamen, a coastal city in Fujian province near to Quemoy.
