A suspected Chinese surveillance balloon flying over the US was yesterday condemned by officials in Taipei and sparked calls for the government to plan countermeasures.
The Pentagon on Thursday said it had detected a Chinese surveillance balloon flying over the country.
Beijing has said the balloon is a civilian meteorological device that drifted into US territory after being blown off course.
Photo courtesy of the Central Weather Bureau
The National Security Bureau and Ministry of National Defense should investigate whether surveillance balloons could be used against Taiwan and prepare to respond to such acts, Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Johnny Chiang (江啟臣) said.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken’s postponement of his visit to China as a result of the incident was a foreseeable consequence arising from the competition for power between the two countries, he added.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs condemned China in a statement, saying that Beijing’s behavior breached international laws and was “unacceptable to the community of civilized nations.”
Photo: Cheng Wei-chi, Taipei Times
China should cease all activities that infringe on the sovereignty of other nations or cause instability in the region, it said.
Premier Chen Chien-jen (陳建仁) urged China to respect the sovereign airspace of other countries, as that would facilitate peace, mutual aid and cooperation between nations.
Lu Yeh-chung (盧業中), a professor in National Chengchi University’s Department of Diplomacy, said the balloon incident showed the “extreme lack of trust” between the US and China.
The two countries are likely to remain locked in competition for some time, Lu added.
That Blinken would delay a long-planned visit to Beijing over the incident hinted at other under-the-table disputes that might have occurred between the US and China while they were preparing for the visit, he said.
The strong response the incident elicited from Washington was diplomatically appropriate, as national security is an issue of utmost importance to the US, Lu said, adding that failing to send a clear signal could embolden China.
Similar balloons were first spotted in Japan’s Miyagi Prefecture in June 2020, although no country claimed ownership of the craft at the time, Central Weather Bureau Director-General Cheng Ming-dean (鄭明典) said.
Bureau personnel observed a balloon of the same type hovering over Taipei in September 2021, and members of the public reported seeing another in March last year, this time above Taipei International Airport (Songshan airport), he said.
The objects were in the two areas for about three hours and photographs were taken of them, Cheng said.
Civilian weather balloons — typically 2m wide and made of rubber — usually hover close to the launch site and at a height of no more than 30km, he said.
The Chinese balloons observed in the Taiwan incidents were no less than 20m wide, and their range and altitude suggest different materials were used to construct them, he said.
Additional reporting by Chou Ming-hung
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