China, U.S. Warplanes Had ‘Unsafe’ South China Sea Encounter
- Pacific Command says incident involved surveillance planes
- U.S. addressing encounter via military, diplomatic channels
U.S. Softens Tone Over South China Sea
This article is for subscribers only.
Two military aircraft from China and the U.S. had an “unsafe” encounter over a disputed part of the South China Sea, the U.S. Pacific Fleet said on Friday, the first publicly confirmed incident since May last year.
A People’s Liberation Army Air Force KJ-200 surveillance plane had “an interaction characterized by U.S. Pacific Command as ‘unsafe’” with a Navy P-3C Orion surveillance aircraft, Pacific Command spokesman Major Robert Shuford said in an e-mail. CNN earlier reported the planes flew within 1,000 feet of each other in the general vicinity of the Scarborough Shoal.