<img height="1" width="1" style="display:none" src="https://www.facebook.com/tr?id=192888919167017&amp;ev=PageView&amp;noscript=1">
Tuesday, March 19, 2024
March 19, 2024

Linkedin Pinterest

China bristles at ‘very irresponsible’ U.S. flight near disputed islands

The Columbian
Published:

BEIJING – China accused the United States on Friday of “very irresponsible” and potentially dangerous actions after a surveillance plane flew near disputed islands in the South China Sea and was warned off by the Chinese navy earlier this week.

On Wednesday, a P-8A Poseidon passed near the disputed Spratly Islands and viewed massive Chinese land reclamation work. The plane was warned to leave eight times by the Chinese navy, according to a CNN team aboard the plane.

Experts said China appeared to trying to create a military exclusion zone around the islands, in a move that could heighten regional tensions.

But Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Hong Lei said the U.S. plane’s approach was “a potential threat to the security of the Chinese island and reef,” adding that it was extremely easy for a misjudgment to occur that could lead to accidents in the air or the water.

“It is very irresponsible and also very dangerous,” he told a regular news conference Friday. “It undermines regional peace and security. China expresses strong dissatisfaction.”

China claims sovereignty over more than 80 percent of the South China Sea. Rival claimants to islands and reefs – set amid fertile fishing grounds and potentially oil- and gas-rich waters – include the Philippines, Vietnam, Taiwan, Malaysia and Brunei.

In the Spratly Islands, China has been engaged in a massive program of land reclamation and construction, including building artificial islands. But when the U.S. plane approached the area this week, it was warned off.

“Foreign military aircraft. This is Chinese navy. You are approaching our military alert zone. Leave immediately,” a radio operator told the aircraft, later bluntly warning: “Go, go.”

After each warning, the U.S. pilots responded calmly that the P-8A was flying through international airspace, according to the CNN team.

The Philippines says similar warnings have been delivered to its military aircraft in the past three months, suggesting that China is trying to exclude foreign military planes from the area.

Although China has acknowledged that the islands will have military uses, Hong insisted that the main purpose of the construction work was “to provide service for search and rescue at sea, fishing security, disaster prevention and relief, and meteorological monitoring, among other things.”

In a commentary published Friday, the Chinese state news agency Xinhua accused the United States of “senseless meddling” in China’s territorial disputes with other nations.

The state-owned tabloid Global Times also said the United States was trying to contain China and “sensationalize” the issue in a bid to apply pressure on Beijing. It argued that neither side wanted a showdown and that “hard-liners in the Pentagon” would soon realize they could not stand in China’s way.

“Now, China has the initiative, and as long as China can finish the construction, this round of intervention by the U.S. will end up futile,” it wrote. “Then, it will have more leverage to carry out its South China Sea policies,” adding that these policies would ultimately safeguard regional security and could establish the Spratly islands as a “navigation and fishing hub.”

On Thursday, a Pentagon spokesman, Col. Steve Warren, said “freedom of navigation operations” would continue in the South China Sea, but he insisted that U.S. military aircraft do not fly directly over areas claimed by China in the Spratly Islands.

“We will continue to fly in international airspace,” he said in Washington.


Washington Post correspondent Liu Liu in Beijing and staff writer Missy Ryan in Washington contributed to this report.

Loading...