A U.S. Navy ship sailed near an artificial island built by China in the South China Sea in a long-anticipated challenge to what the Obama administration considers Beijing’s “excessive claim” of sovereignty in those waters, a US defense official said on Monday.
The official said the White House approved the movement by the USS Lassen, a guided missile destroyer, inside what China claims as a 12-nautical-mile (22-kilometer) territorial limit around the Subi Reef in the Spratly Islands archipelago, a disputed group of hundreds of reefs, islets, atolls and islands in the South China Sea.
The patrol was completed without incident, said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss the
Lassen’s movements. A Pentagon spokesman, Navy Cmdr. Bill Urban, declined to comment.
The Obama administration has long said it will exercise a right to freedom of navigation in any international waters, including in the South China Sea. The point of sailing a US ship within 12 nautical miles of any of the artificial islands created by China would be to demonstrate the US assertion that they are not sovereign Chinese territory.
“Make no mistake, the United States will fly, sail and operate wherever international law allows, as we do around the world; and the South China Sea is not and will not be an exception,” Defense Secretary Ash Carter said on October 13.
“We’ll do that at times and places of our choosing,” Carter said. “And there’s no exception to that, whether it’s the Arctic or the sea lanes that fuel international commerce widely around the world, or the South China Sea.” Asked for comment about the US move, a spokesman at the Chinese embassy in Washington, Zhu Haiquan, said China respects freedom of navigation in the South China Sea.
“Freedom of navigation and overflight should not be used as excuse to flex muscle and undermine other countries’ sovereignty and security,” he said. “We urge the US to refrain from saying or doing anything provocative and act responsibly in maintaining regional peace and stability.”
State Department Spokesman John Kirby said on Monday the US would not be required to consult with other nations if it decided to conduct freedom of navigation operations in international waters anywhere on the globe.
“The whole point of freedom of navigation in international waters is that it’s international waters. You don’t need to consult with anybody. That’s the idea,” Kirby said. He referred questions about specific Navy ship movements to the Pentagon.
China’s assertive behavior in the South China Sea has become an increasingly sore point in relations with the US, even as Obama and Chinese President Xi Jinping have sought to deepen cooperation in other areas, such as climate change.
China claims virtually all of the South China Sea. The Philippines and other countries that have territorial disputes with China in the busy sea have been particularly concerned by China’s recent land-reclamation projects that have turned a number of previously submerged reefs in the Spratly archipelago into artificial islands with runways and wharves.
Adm. Harry Harris Jr., commander of the US Pacific Command, has said the South China Sea is no more China’s than the Gulf of Mexico is Mexico’s.
The US should exercise caution in its foray into the South China Sea defined by Beijing as sovereign waters, the Chinese Foreign Ministry cited Foreign Minister Wang Yi as saying on Tuesday.
(AP/PNA/Sputnik)
Image credits: AP/ Koji Sasahara