WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The U.S. Navy confirmed on Tuesday two of its ships carried out a Taiwan Strait transit, calling it routine despite an angry reaction from Beijing.
The Navy said the vessels were the Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyer USS Ralph Johnson and Pathfinder-class survey ship USNS Bowditch. The ships carried out a north-to-south transit February 10-12, it said.
“The transit occurred through a corridor in the Taiwan Strait that is beyond any coastal state’s territorial seas,” said Navy Commander Matthew Comer, a spokesperson at the U.S. military’s Indo-Pacific Command.
“Within this corridor all nations enjoy high-seas freedom of navigation, overflight, and other internationally lawful uses of the sea related to these freedoms.”
(Reporting by Phil Stewart and Idrees Ali; Editing by Tom Hogue)
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