After two days of Chinese military drills to the south of the island, which Beijing considers to be its own sovereign state, a U.S. Navy patrol plane passed across the strategically important Taiwan Strait on Thursday.
Asserting that it “has sovereignty, sovereign rights, and jurisdiction” over the waterway, China has expressed outrage about U.S. military operations across the narrow strait, which are often conducted by warships but occasionally by aircraft. That is disputed by Taiwan and the US, who maintain that it is an international waterway.
The P-8A Poseidon maritime patrol and reconnaissance plane, which is also employed for anti-submarine operations, was in international airspace as it passed across the strait, according to the 7th Fleet of the U.S. Navy.
The statement read, “The United States upholds the navigational rights and freedoms of all nations by operating within the Taiwan Strait in accordance with international law.”
“The aircraft’s passage over the Taiwan Strait shows the United States’ dedication to an open and free Indo-Pacific. Anywhere that international law permits, the US military can operate.
According to Taiwan’s defense ministry, the plane flew south on Thursday morning while staying close to the strait’s median line, with Taiwanese personnel keeping watch.
The median line usually acts as an informal border between Taiwan and China, but ever since those large-scale war simulations were held nearby in August of last year, China’s military planes have repeatedly crossed it, if only briefly.
The operation came after two days of fresh Chinese training exercises close to Taiwan, which saw fighters, bombers, and warships primarily flying to the southern part of the island and out into the Pacific through the Bashi Channel that divides Taiwan from the Philippines.
Despite China’s silence on the exercises, they were staged less than two weeks before Taiwan’s own yearly drills and at a NATO meeting when alliance leaders stated that China’s “ambitions and coercive policies” pose a threat to their interests, security, and values.
(Reuters)
