China reports that at least 10 balloons from the United States have flown over its airspace in the last year

As tension grows and doubts about the flying objects that Washington has shot down in the last week multiply, China reported on Monday that several US balloons have entered its airspace since January 2022.

The White House quickly came out to deny the allegations. “Any claim that the US government operates surveillance balloons over the People’s Republic of China is false,” National Security Council spokeswoman Adrienne Watson said on her Twitter account, adding that it is the Asian country “that has an high-altitude surveillance balloon for intelligence gathering”.

Relations between the United States and China soured further after Washington on Feb. 4 shot down a suspected Chinese spy device, which Beijing said was for civilian purposes.

China says the balloon shot down by the United States was an unmanned aircraft built for meteorological research that had gone drifting. He accused the United States of overreacting by shooting him down and threatened unspecified action in retaliation.

Since other artifacts have been toppled of this type that have flown over the United States and Canada, although China has only admitted that the former was its own.

This weekend, Chinese state media reported that an unidentified flying object had been sighted off the east coast of the country and that the army was preparing to shoot it down.

On Monday, Beijing refused to comment on the information, merely referring reporters to the Defense Ministry, which did not respond to AFP’s questions. But the government has accused the United States of sending more than ten balloons into its airspace since January 2022.

“It is not uncommon for the United States to enter other countries’ airspace illegally,” Foreign Ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin said at a news conference.

“In the past year alone, American balloons have flown over China more than 10 times without any authorization,” he said.

Wang said the United States should “reflect on itself first and change course, instead of vilifying and fomenting confrontation.”

Asked how China has responded to those alleged incursions, Wang said Beijing’s “handling (of these incidents) has been responsible and professional.”

“If you want to know more about US high-altitude balloons illegally entering Chinese airspace, I suggest you refer to the US side,” he added.

more vigilance

The United States has increased surveillance of its airspace as the number of air raids increases, which Beijing denied it was aware of on Monday.

The Pentagon said Sunday it did not yet know what three other objects were shot down: one over Alaska on Friday, another over Canada’s Yukon Territory on Saturday, and most recently over Lake Huron on Sunday.

Authorities said the object shot down Sunday had been tracked for nearly a day and it looked nothing like the alleged Chinese surveillance balloon which was wrecked off the Atlantic coast 4 February after going across country.

President Joe Biden ordered an F-16 fighter jet to shoot down the last object “out of an abundance of caution,” a senior administration official said.

Item was described by the official as an octagonal structure from which ropes hung.

It drifted about 20,000 feet above Michigan and could have posed a hazard to civil aviation, according to the official.

For his part, General Glen VanHerck, head of the US Northern Command, told the press that after sending planes to inspect the most recent object, they concluded that there were no signs of a threatas with the previous objects.

“What we’re seeing are very, very small objects producing a very, very low radar cross section,” he said.

Though he declined to describe the shape or size of the objects, he said they moved very slowly, at the speed of the wind.

Speculation about its nature has skyrocketed in recent days. “I’m going to let the intelligence community and the counterintelligence community figure that out,” VanHerck said.

Source: AFP