Global Courant 2023-04-17 08:22:34
USS Milius conducted a “routine” transit through the Taiwan Strait to demonstrate the US’s commitment to a free and open Indo-Pacific, the Navy says.
A US warship has sailed through the Taiwan Strait in what the country’s navy described as a routine transit just days after China ended its latest war games around the island.
In a statement Monday, the US Navy’s 7th Fleet said the Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyer USS Milius passed through the Taiwan Strait on Sunday.
The warship was making a “routine transit through the Taiwan Strait” through waters “where freedom of navigation and overflight on the high seas applies in accordance with international law,” it said.
The ship’s transit demonstrates Washington’s commitment to a free and open Indo-Pacific, it added.
There was no immediate comment from China.
Beijing, which considers Taiwan its own territory, officially ended its three-day exercises around Taiwan last Monday, where it practiced precision strikes and blockaded the island.
It organized the exercises to express anger over Taiwan’s President Tsai Ing-wen’s meeting with US House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, deeming it an interference in China’s internal affairs and US support for Taiwan’s separate identity from China.
The US Navy sails warships through the Taiwan Strait about once a month and also regularly conducts similar freedom of navigation missions in the disputed South China Sea.
Last week, the USS Milius sailed near one of the main man-made and Chinese-controlled islands in the South China Sea, Mischief Reef.
Beijing denounced it as illegal.
China has continued its military activities around Taiwan since the end of the exercises, albeit on a smaller scale.
On Monday morning, Taiwan’s defense ministry said it had seen 18 Chinese military aircraft and four naval vessels operating around Taiwan in the past 24 hours.
China has never refrained from using force to bring democratically governed Taiwan under its control.
Taiwan’s government rejects China’s territorial claims, saying only the island’s people can decide their future.
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