Chinese warplanes buzz Canadian navy ships
Credit to Author: The Manila Times| Date: Fri, 28 Jun 2019 16:14:47 +0000
OTTAWA: Two Canadian naval vessels were “buzzed” by Chinese fighter jets when they sailed through the East China Sea this week, the Canadian military said on Thursday (Friday in Manila).
A Canadian navy helicopter was also targeted by a laser detected from a nearby fishing boat, it said in a statement.
There were no injuries nor damage, but the revelations come amid heightened tensions between the two nations over Canada’s arrest of a senior telecoms executive last December.
Canada’s defense ministry said the frigate HMCS Regina and support vessel Asterix were in “international waters in the East China Sea” when two Chinese Su-30 fighter jets “passed the ship at a range of approximately 300 meters (985 feet) and an altitude of approximately 100 feet.”
The so-called “buzzing” happened on Monday at around 3:30 p.m. local time, it said.
Ottawa described the interactions as “professional and cordial,” adding that the Chinese fly-past was “not hazardous, nor unexpected” given the naval operation’s proximity to China.
“This was not a dangerous scenario but it is one that we certainly paid close attention to,” Regina’s captain, Cmdr. Jake French, was quoted as saying. “I will not characterize their intent, but we have seen a lot of ‘fast air’ over the past week flying from where many of their bases are.”
Canadian Global Affairs Institute fellow Matthew Fisher said that the ship had been followed for weeks by Chinese destroyers, frigates, corvettes and coast guard cutters as it traveled through the disputed South China Sea, which China claims virtually in its entirety, through the Taiwan Strait and into the East China Sea.
Both ships had just come from a visit to Vietnam’s Cam Ranh Bay and were headed to Northeast Asia to join a multinational effort to prevent smuggling in evasion of UN sanctions against North Korea.
The event comes amid Chinese fury over Canada’s arrest of Meng Wanzhou, the chief financial officer of Chinese tech giant Huawei, in December at the request of the United States. Meng, who is also the daughter of Huawei’s founder, is under house arrest in her Vancouver mansion.
In apparent response, China has arrested two Canadians for alleged spying, sentenced another to death for drug smuggling, and this week suspended imports of Canadian meat products.
AFP AND AP
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