The USS Mustin, an Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyer, sailed through the Taiwan Strait yesterday, the 12th time this year that a US warship transited the waterway.
The US 7th Fleet said in a statement that the Mustin conducted a routine transit in accordance with international law.
“The ship’s transit through the Taiwan Strait demonstrates the US commitment to a free and open Indo-Pacific. The United States military will continue to fly, sail and operate anywhere international law allows,” the statement read.
Photo: EPA/EFE
The Ministry of National Defense said that the US vessel entered the Strait from the north and headed south.
Taiwan University associate professor of political science Chen Shih-min (陳世民) said that the US Navy is conducting warship transits through the Strait to support freedom of navigation in waters near Taiwan and its national security.
The transits show that the US would not tolerate China’s behavior of circling Taiwan’s territorial waters and airspace with warships and military aircraft, or its attempt to transform the Strait into Chinese territory, he said.
US warships sailed through the Strait nine times last year.
Institute for National Defense and Security Research assistant research fellow Jeremy Hung (洪子傑) said that the higher number of US transits this year reflects the US-China competition for influence in the region.
“In addition to warships, US military aircraft have also carried out more fly-bys in the airspace [around Taiwan] with their IFF [identification friend or foe] systems turned on, a move that is calculated to telegraph their presence to other countries and send a political message,” he said.
The previous time a US warship navigated the Strait was on Nov. 21.
The US 7th Fleet in a Facebook post the same day identified the ship as the Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyer USS Barry.
“The ship’s transit through the Taiwan Strait demonstrates the US commitment to a free and open Indo-Pacific. The US Navy will continue to fly, sail and operate anywhere international law allows,” the post said.
“The United States and Taiwan are strong partners in defending freedom, advancing economic ties, and promoting our shared democratic values. The American Institute in Taiwan Economic Prosperity Partnership Dialogue strengthens our economic relationship even further,” US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo wrote on Twitter the same day.
Taiwan’s Lee Chia-hao (李佳豪) on Sunday won a silver medal at the All England Open Badminton Championships in Birmingham, England, a career best. Lee, 25, took silver in the final of the men’s singles against world No. 1 Shi Yuqi (石宇奇) of China, who won 21-17, 21-19 in a tough match that lasted 51 minutes. After the match, the Taiwanese player, who ranks No. 22 in the world, said it felt unreal to be challenging an opponent of Shi’s caliber. “I had to be in peak form, and constantly switch my rhythm and tactics in order to score points effectively,” he said. Lee got
EMBRACING TAIWAN: US lawmakers have introduced an act aiming to replace the use of ‘Chinese Taipei’ with ‘Taiwan’ across all Washington’s federal agencies A group of US House of Representatives lawmakers has introduced legislation to replace the term “Chinese Taipei” with “Taiwan” across all federal agencies. US Representative Byron Donalds announced the introduction of the “America supports Taiwan act,” which would mandate federal agencies adopt “Taiwan” in place of “Chinese Taipei,” a news release on his page on the US House of Representatives’ Web site said. US representatives Mike Collins, Barry Moore and Tom Tiffany are cosponsors of the legislation, US political newspaper The Hill reported yesterday. “The legislation is a push to normalize the position of Taiwan as an autonomous country, although the official US
CHANGE OF TONE: G7 foreign ministers dropped past reassurances that there is no change in the position of the G7 members on Taiwan, including ‘one China’ policies G7 foreign ministers on Friday took a tough stance on China, stepping up their language on Taiwan and omitting some conciliatory references from past statements, including to “one China” policies. A statement by ministers meeting in Canada mirrored last month’s Japan-US statement in condemning “coercion” toward Taiwan. Compared with a G7 foreign ministers’ statement in November last year, the statement added members’ concerns over China’s nuclear buildup, although it omitted references to their concerns about Beijing’s human rights abuses in Xinjiang, Tibet and Hong Kong. Also missing were references stressing the desire for “constructive and stable relations with China” and
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs yesterday said it has lodged a protest with Pretoria after the name of the Taipei Liaison Office in South Africa was changed to the “Taipei Commercial Office” on the South African Department of International Relations and Cooperation’s (DIRCO) Web site. In October last year, the South African government asked Taiwan to relocate the Taipei Liaison Office, the nation’s de facto embassy, out of Pretoria. It later agreed to continue negotiating through official channels, but in January asked that the office be relocated by the end of this month. As of the middle of last month, DIRCO’s Web
RSS