BEIJING: China’s first entirely home-built aircraft carrier began sea trials on Sunday in a sign of the growing sophistication of the country’s domestic arms industry.

The still-unnamed ship left dock in the northern port of Dalian at 7am to “test the reliability and stability of its propulsion and other system”, the Defence Ministry said in a statement.

State media reports say China is also planning to build a nuclear-powered aircraft carrier capable of remaining at sea for long durations. China has the world’s largest navy in terms of numbers of ships, although it lags behind the US in technology and combat capabilities. It has been deployed to assert China’s claim to virtually the entire South China Sea and is increasingly ranging farther into the Pacific and Indian oceans.

Published in Dawn, May 14th, 2018