Two US Navy warships sailed through international waters in the Taiwan Strait on Sunday, the first such operation since US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan infuriating China, which considers the island as its territory.
The US Navy, confirming a Reuters report, said the cruisers Chancellorsville and Antietam were conducting the ongoing operation. These operations usually take eight to twelve hours to complete and are closely monitored by the Chinese military.
In recent years, US warships, and sometimes those of allied nations such as Britain and Canada, have routinely sailed through the strait, angering China, which claims Taiwan over its own objections. democratically elected government.
Pelosi’s trip to Taiwan in early August angered China, which saw it as an attempt by the United States to interfere in its internal affairs. China subsequently launched military exercises near the island that have since continued.
“These (US) ships transited a corridor in the strait that lies beyond the territorial sea of any coastal state,” the US Navy said.
USS Chancellorsville, one of the ships currently in the Taiwan Strait.AP
The operation demonstrates America’s commitment to a free and open Indo-Pacific, and the US military flies, sails and operates wherever international law allows, the navy said.
The Chinese military’s Eastern Theater Command said it was tracking the ships and warning them.
“Troops in theater remain on high alert and are ready to thwart any provocation at any time,” he added in a statement.
Taiwan’s defense ministry said the ships were sailing in a southerly direction and that its forces were observing but that “the situation was normal”.
The Taiwan Strait has been a frequent source of military tension since the defeated government of the Republic of China fled to Taiwan in 1949 after losing a civil war with the Communists, who established the People’s Republic of China.
Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan was followed about a week later by a group of five other US lawmakers, and China’s military responded by conducting more exercises near the island.
This is the first time since Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan that US warships have been active in the area. REUTERS/Tyrone Siu
Sen. Marsha Blackburn, a US lawmaker on the Senate Commerce and Armed Services committees, arrived in Taiwan on Thursday in the third visit by a US dignitary this month, defying pressure from China to halt the trips.
The administration of US President Joe Biden has tried to prevent the tension between Washington and Beijing from becoming a conflict, and has reiterated that trips to Congress are routine.
The United States does not have formal diplomatic relations with Taiwan, but is required by law to provide the island with the means to defend itself.
China has never ruled out using force to bring Taiwan under its control.
Taiwan says the People’s Republic of China has never ruled the island and therefore has no claim, and that only Taiwan’s 23 million people can decide its future.