Taiwan’s President Lai Ching-te is preparing to sound a warning about China’s latest plans to apply pressure against the island by holding military drills that will coincide with his major speech on Thursday.

Taiwan President Lai Ching-te is escalating tensions with "sinister intentions", China's government said, ahead of a keynote speech Lai will give in Taipei that could set off a Chinese military response.

It is “absolutely impossible” for Communist China to become Taiwan’s motherland because the island’s government is older, Taiwan’s president has said in a carefully timed speech that underscores the intense historical rivalry between the two.