Australia has accused a Chinese military aircraft of releasing flares \u201cin close proximity\u201d to its patrol jet over the South China Sea.<\/p>\n
The Australian government has raised its concern with Beijing over the \u201cunsafe and unprofessional\u201d manoeuvre, the defence department said in a statement on Monday.<\/p>\n
There was no damage to Australia\u2019s P-8A aircraft and its personnel were unharmed after Sunday\u2019s encounter.<\/p>\n
A Chinese military spokesperson said the Australian jet \u201cillegally intruded\u201d into China\u2019s airspace and had to be expelled.<\/p>\n
The Australian aircraft\u2019s actions \u201cseriously infringed upon China\u2019s sovereignty\u201d, Senior Colonel Li Jianjian, spokesperson for China\u2019s Southern Theater Command Air Force said, urging Canberra to \u201cimmediately cease its infringing and provocative actions\u201d.<\/p>\n
Australia Defence Force said it expects all countries, including China, to operate their militaries in a safe and professional manner.<\/p>\n
This is the latest in a string of encounters between the two countries\u2019 militaries in the region, where China\u2019s vast claims over islands and outcrops overlap with those of its neighbours.<\/p>\n
Sunday\u2019s incident also occurred as Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese was heading to the US for a meeting with President Donald Trump, where the two leaders are expected to discuss the Aukus \u2013 a multi-billion dollar submarine deal between Australia, the US and the UK.<\/p>\n
Australia has also accused a Chinese jet of dropping flares near an Australian plane in the area in February. China at that time said the Australian jet had intentionally intruded into its airspace and that its response was \u201clawful and restrained\u201d.<\/p>\n
While it has no claims to the South China Sea, Australia has aligned itself close to the US and its allies in saying that China\u2019s assertions have no legal basis.<\/p>\n
In May last year, Australia accused a Chinese fighter plane of dropping flares close to an Australian navy helicopter that was part of a UN Security Council mission on the Yellow Sea off the Korean coastline.<\/p>\n
In November 2023, Canberra accused Beijing\u2019s navy of using sonar pulses in international waters off Japan, which resulted in injuries to Australian divers.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Australia has accused a Chinese military aircraft of releasing flares \u201cin close proximity\u201d to its patrol jet over the South China Sea. The Australian government has raised its concern with Beijing over the \u201cunsafe and unprofessional\u201d manoeuvre, the defence department said in a statement on Monday. There was no damage to Australia\u2019s P-8A aircraft and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-123440","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","entry"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/123440","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=123440"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/123440\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=123440"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=123440"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=123440"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}