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Narrowing the differences between China and US over Taiwan Strait
The heart of the recent disagreement between China and the United States about the Taiwan Strait is not whether it is ‘international waters’, but whether non-Chinese military vessels and aircraft have rights to transit and operate there.
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China’s aircraft carrier Liaoning taking part in a military drill in the western Pacific Ocean in 2018.
PHOTO: REUTERS
Lynn Kuok
A new source of tension has emerged in the relationship between China and the United States in recent months, with Chinese military officials telling their US counterparts that they do not consider the Taiwan Strait to be "international waters", a term used by the US.
According to a June 12 report by Bloomberg, these assertions have been made "on multiple occasions and at multiple levels", causing alarm among US officials. A day after the Bloomberg report was published, China's Foreign Ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin confirmed at a press conference on June 13 that, in China's view, the concept of "international waters" does not apply to the Taiwan Strait because it has "no legal basis… in the international law of the sea".
