“A U.S. warship sailed through a sensitive waterway separating Taiwan from China on Thursday (August 22, 2024),” the U.S. Navy said, as a way to demonstrate Washington’s “commitment to upholding freedom of navigation”.
Preventing a China-Taiwan conflict
China claims democratic Taiwan as part of its territory, and has in recent years upped military pressures by sending in increasing numbers of fighter jets, drones, and naval vessels around the island.
Thursday’s transit of the 180-km Taiwan Strait comes as the U.S. and its allies have increased crossings to reinforce its status as an international waterway, angering Beijing.
The voyage showed Washington’s “commitment to upholding freedom of navigation for all nations as a principle”, the U.S. Navy’s Seventh Fleet said in a statement on Thursday.
“No member of the international community should be intimidated or coerced into giving up their rights and freedoms.”
Taiwan’s Defence Ministry confirmed that the warship sailed south to north, and that “no anomaly was detected in our surroundings”.
Beijing’s People’s Liberation Army dismissed the transit as “a public hype” and said its Eastern Theatre Command “organised naval and air forces to tail and stand guard against the U.S. ship’s passage throughout the entire process”.
Chinese troops “are on constant high alert to resolutely defend national sovereignty,” it said in a statement.
