{"id":24131,"date":"2014-08-28T22:40:47","date_gmt":"2014-08-28T14:40:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/?p=24131"},"modified":"2014-08-28T22:15:52","modified_gmt":"2014-08-28T14:15:52","slug":"china-says-intercept-of-us-spy-plane-was-professional-urges-end-to-close-in-reconnaissance","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/2014\/08\/28\/china-says-intercept-of-us-spy-plane-was-professional-urges-end-to-close-in-reconnaissance\/","title":{"rendered":"China says intercept of US spy plane was professional, urges end to close in reconnaissance"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"A<\/a>
A P-8A Poseidon flying alongside a Lockheed P-3 Orion. Photo courtesy of U.S. Navy photo \/ Liz Goettee \/ Wikimedia Commons.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

BEIJING\u2014China\u2019s Defence Ministry rejected U.S. accusations that a Chinese fighter jet\u2019s intercept of a U.S. Navy surveillance aircraft off the southern Chinese coast was dangerous, and blamed Washington for mounting large-scale and frequent close-in reconnaissance operations.<\/p>\n

Ministry spokesman Yang Yujun said the Chinese pilot conducted operations that were \u201cprofessional and the Chinese jet kept a safe distance from the U.S. planes.\u201d<\/p>\n

He called the U.S. accusations \u201cgroundless\u201d in a statement issued Saturday night, and said that China was conducting \u201croutine identification and verification\u201d flights.<\/p>\n

Pentagon press secretary Rear Adm. John Kirby gave a different account Friday of the Aug. 19 encounter about 135 miles (220 kilometres) east of China\u2019s Hainan Island. He said the Chinese jet made several close passes by the Navy P-8 Poseidon plane, coming within 30 feet (9 metres) of it at one point.<\/p>\n

Kirby said that included the Chinese jet doing a \u201cbarrel roll\u201d manoeuvr over the top of the Poseidon\u2014a modified Boeing 737\u2014and passing across the nose of the Navy plane apparently to show that it was armed. Kirby said the Chinese jet\u2019s manoeuvring posed a risk to the safety of the U.S. air crew and was \u201cinconsistent with customary international law.\u201d<\/p>\n

He said it was the fourth such incident since March of \u201cclose intercepts\u201d involving Chinese jets.<\/p>\n

The Chinese statement also said that a Navy P-3 Orion, an anti-submarine and surveillance aircraft, flew alongside the Poseidon. The Pentagon did not mention the second aircraft.<\/p>\n

Tensions between the two countries have risen in the South China Sea, as China disputes territorial claims with U.S. ally the\u00a0Philippines, Vietnam and other neighbours.<\/p>\n

In 2001, a Chinese jet collided with a U.S. Navy surveillance aircraft off Hainan Island, killing the Chinese pilot and forcing the Navy plane to make an emergency landing on the island. Washington severed military relations with China after that episode.<\/p>\n

In the latest encounter, Yang blamed \u201cthe large-scale and highly frequent close-in reconnaissance by the U.S. against China\u201d as \u201cthe root cause of accidents endangering the sea and air military security between China and the United States.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

BEIJING\u2014China\u2019s Defence Ministry rejected U.S. accusations that a Chinese fighter jet\u2019s intercept of a U.S. Navy surveillance aircraft off the …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":44,"featured_media":24132,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1145,17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-24131","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headline","category-news-w","mauthors-jack-chang","mauthors-the-associated-press"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24131","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/44"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=24131"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24131\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/24132"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=24131"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=24131"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=24131"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}