Two US military vessels transited the Taiwan Strait from Sunday through early yesterday, the Ministry of National Defense said in a statement, the first such mission since US President Donald Trump took office last month.
The two vessels sailed south through the Strait, the ministry said, adding that it closely monitored nearby airspace and waters at the time and observed nothing unusual.
The ministry did not name the two vessels, but the US Navy identified them as the Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyer USS Ralph Johnson and the Pathfinder-class survey ship USNS Bowditch.
Photo: EPA-EFE
The ships carried out a north-to-south transit from Monday to yesterday, a US military spokesperson said.
“The transit occurred through a corridor in the Taiwan Strait that is beyond any coastal state’s territorial seas,” said US Navy Commander Matthew Comer, a spokesperson at the US military’s Indo-Pacific Command.
“Within this corridor all nations enjoy high-seas freedom of navigation, overflight and other internationally lawful uses of the sea related to these freedoms,” Comer said.
The US 7th Fleet did not publicize the passage in a news release, as was standard during the previous administration of former US president Joe Biden.
The confirmations made by the US and Taiwanese militaries came after China made a statement regarding the transit earlier yesterday.
The Chinese state-run Global Times quoted Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) Eastern Theater Command spokesman Li Xi (李熹) as saying that Chinese forces have “deployed naval and air forces to monitor the entire passage of the US vessels, effectively responding to and managing the situation.”
“The actions of the US sent the wrong signals and increased security risks. The Eastern Theater Command remains on high alert, resolutely safeguarding national sovereignty and security, as well as regional peace and stability,” Li said.
China’s Taiwan Affairs Office spokeswoman Zhu Fenglian (朱鳳蓮) in Beijing said that Taiwan was a “core interest” for the country and that the US should act with caution.
“We are resolutely opposed to this and will never allow any outside interference, and have the firm will, full confidence and capability to uphold the country’s sovereignty and territorial integrity,” she said.
“I really do not need to explain further who is the so-called troublemaker around the Taiwan Strait. All other countries in the neighborhood have a deep appreciation of this,” ministry spokesman Sun Li-fang (孫立方) told reporters in Taipei.
The US Navy, sometimes joined by allies, makes regular transits through the Taiwan Strait in what it calls exercising freedom of navigation rights.
The last time a US warship transited the Strait was on Oct. 20 last year.
It was an Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyer USS Higgins, along with a Royal Canadian Navy Halifax-class frigate HMCS Vancouver.
Chinese state television yesterday said that since Lunar New Year’s Eve on Jan. 28, the PLA’s Eastern Theater Command had repeatedly dispatched sea and air forces to carry out “combat readiness” patrols and training missions around Taiwan.
The operations aim to “guard the joy and peace of the people on both sides of the Taiwan Strait,” the report said.
A signaling system malfunction disrupted high-speed rail (HSR) services beginning at 8am today, with trains temporarily reduced to three northbound and three southbound trains per hour as authorities conduct inspections. The malfunction occurred on a section of track in Miaoli County during pre-operation checks early this morning, forcing northbound and southbound trains to use a single track, the HSR operator said. The regular schedule has been replaced with three hourly trains offering only nonreserved seating in each direction, stopping at every station, it said, adding that business class cars would still have reserved seating. Departures from terminal stations are scheduled at the top
Taiwan is still in the process of assessing the possibility of recruiting workers from Eswatini, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said yesterday, adding that its goal is to help Eswatini upgrade its vocational training centers. If there are plans to recruit workers from Eswatini, safeguarding national security, protecting public health and ensuring the employment rights of Taiwanese would be prerequisites, Department of West Asian and African Affairs Director-General Yen Chia-liang (顏嘉良) told a news conference. Key considerations would also include filling labor shortages in specific industries, and fostering bilateral professional and technical exchanges, he said. Yen was asked about the progress of labor
A US uncrewed surface vessel (USV) encountered multiple Chinese warships during an autonomous transit of the Taiwan Strait, US defense company Seasats said in a statement on Wednesday. Seasats announced that a Lightfish USV had completed the first autonomous transit of the Taiwan Strait. Over five days, the USV traversed the entire length of the Strait while constantly monitoring surface vessel traffic, the company said. The Lightfish encountered multiple Chinese warships, one of which was a Chinese People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) Type 056 corvette, it said. The Chinese vessels were operating “well within Taiwan’s exclusive economic zone without transmitting their identity via the
VERBOSE VESSELS: A CGA cutter and a China Coast Guard exchanged verbal barbs for more than a day in Taiwanese-controlled waters before the Chinese vessel left The Taiwanese and Chinese coast guards had a standoff near the strategically located Pratas Islands (Dongsha Islands, 東沙群島) in the north of the South China Sea, the Coast Guard Administration (CGA) said yesterday. The two sides engaged in intense radio exchanges over sovereignty claims during the 33-hour standoff. China Coast Guard vessel 3501 eventually left the restricted waters, 26.6 nautical miles (49.2km) west of the Pratas Islands, at 5pm yesterday, the CGA said. Lying approximately between southern Taiwan and Hong Kong, the Taiwan-controlled Pratas are seen by some security experts as vulnerable to Chinese attack due to their distance — more than
RSS