WASHINGTON\u2014A U.S. Navy warship on Friday passed through waters claimed by China near disputed islands in the South China Sea, the Defence Department said, drawing Chinese condemnation.<\/p>\n
A department spokesman, Navy Cmdr. Gary Ross, said the destroyer ship USS Decatur conducted the transit operation near the Paracel Islands. He said it was done \u201cin a routine, lawful manner without ship escorts and without incident.\u201d<\/p>\n
A Chinese defence ministry statement called it \u201ca gravely illegal act\u201d and \u201cintentionally provocative.\u201d The Chinese navy sent a guided missile destroyer and an escort vessel that \u201cspotted and verified the American ships and warned them to leave,\u201d the statement said.<\/p>\n
Ross said there was just one U.S. vessel involved.<\/p>\n
The Paracels, a group of islands and reefs, are occupied by China but are also claimed by Vietnam and Taiwan. Ross said the ship passed within an \u201cexcessive\u201d claim of territorial waters by China between two land features, although it did not go within 12 nautical miles of them.<\/p>\n
He did not specify where in the Paracels the ship sailed.<\/p>\n
The U.S. Navy has now conducted four freedom-of-navigation operations in the past year in the South China Sea, where China has reclaimed land on a massive scale to assert its claim to disputed features \u2014 mostly in the Spratly islands that lie further south.<\/p>\n
China has looked dimly upon the U.S. operations, which it views as meddling in waters where the U.S. does not have territorial claims. Friday’s operation comes a day after the leader of the Philippines, one of the six governments with claims in the South China Sea, announced during a visit to Beijing his nation’s \u201cseparation\u201d from the United States, as it seeks to deepen ties with China.<\/p>\n
Ross said the operation was unrelated to any such event.<\/p>\n
The Chinese statement accused the U.S. of being a \u201ctroublemaker\u201d in the South China at a time when \u201cunder the joint efforts of countries in this region\u201d the situation is developing positively.<\/p>\n
\u201cUnder these circumstances, for the U.S. to deploy ships to violate Chinese territorial waters is to wish for the whole world to be in chaos\u201d and to cause troubles from which the U.S. can profit, the statement said.<\/p>\n
Ross denied the operation was provocative.<\/p>\n
He said the U.S. conducts these operations on a regular basis around the world. He said the operation \u201cdemonstrated that coastal states may not unlawfully restrict the navigation rights, freedoms and lawful uses of the sea\u201d that all states are entitled to exercise under international law.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis operation was about challenging excessive maritime claims, not territorial claims to land features. The United States has been clear that we take no position on competing territorial sovereignty claims to naturally formed land features in the South China Sea,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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