Tuesday, August 27, 2024
Year : 2, Issue: 34
Japan has protested the breaching of its airspace by a Chinese surveillance aircraft, in what it called the “first known case of incursion by China’s military into its territorial airspace.” According to Japan’s defence ministry, a PLA spy plane briefly entered Japanese territory near Nagasaki Prefecture around 11:30 a.m. on Monday.
According to the Japanese Ministry of Defense, the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) Y-9 surveillance aircraft entered Japanese airspace very briefly for two minutes over the uninhabited Danjo Islands in the East China Sea. China and Japan are engaged in territorial disputes over large swathes of the East China Sea.
In response, Japan’s Self-Defense Force (JASDF) scrambled fighter jets on high alert and issued a warning to the Chinese aircraft.
The Japanese government has protested the incursion with China. According to the Japanese Foreign Ministry, Japan’s Vice Foreign Minister Masataka Okano summoned a senior official at the Chinese Embassy in Tokyo to lodge a complaint about the incursion and to demand no such breaches happen again in the future. The Chinese Foreign Ministry has not commented on the incident.
The incident that occurred a day before White House National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan’s visit to Beijing has raised brows. While military analysts think Monday’s airspace violation could be a message from Beijing challenging Japan’s delineation of its territorial border, the fact that it occurred near Nagasaki Prefecture and not Senkaku has stoked confusion.
Source: The Week
