Chinese President Xi Jinping decided himself to let ballistic missiles, launched by the military during recent large-scale drills near Taiwan, fall in Japan's exclusive economic zone to deter Tokyo's interference in any cross-strait contingency, according to sources close to the matter.

Xi, who heads the Central Military Commission, the highest decision-making organ of the country's armed forces, ditched a plan to avoid conducting exercises last week in waters overlapping Japan's EEZ to make the training in six areas encircling Taiwan more combat-oriented, the sources said.

The large-scale exercises began on Aug. 4 as part of China's response to U.S. House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi's visit earlier last week to the self-ruled island.