washington has “clearly overreacted”. Beijing expressed, on Sunday February 5, its “strong dissatisfaction”, after the United States shot down the Chinese balloon that had been flying over their soil for several days. This decision “seriously violates international practices”said the Chinese Foreign Ministry, which “reserves the right” to replicate.
China “protests against the use of force by the United States”, hammered the minister. The operation carried out on Saturday by an F-22 fighter jet took place “over water off the coast of South Carolina, in US airspace”, according to US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin. He pointed out that it had been carried out in response to a “unacceptable violation” of the “sovereignty” American.
An aircraft “used for research purposes”, defends China
US President Joe Biden praised the pilots who led “with success” this delicate operation. Washington assures us that it was a spy balloon, which “was used by the People’s Republic of China in an attempt to monitor strategic sites” in the United States, said Lloyd Austin. According to Pentagon officials, the balloon first entered US airspace on January 28 over Alaska, before entering Canada on January 30, then back into US airspace at level of Idaho, in the northwestern United States, on January 31.
Beijing acknowledged that the device came from China, but assured that it was a “civil aircraft, used for research purposes, mainly meteorological”, which was “diverted from its trajectory”. The affair has cast a chill over relations between the two countries, prompting the postponement of a visit by the head of American diplomacy, Antony Blinken, to China.