The Australian defence minister has said the department of defence will not discuss a recent allegation that the Chinese military shadowed an Australian warship as it sailed through international waters on its way to perform military exercises with the Japanese navy.
“Formal challenges have occurred, such as telling us that we’re entering ‘China’s territorial waters,” the source allegedly told the ABC. “The most intense activity occurred as HMAS Parramatta was in the East China Sea.”
The ABC report alleged that the HMAS Parramatta was closely followed by a Type 052C “Luyang II” guided-missile destroyer and a Type 093-A “Shang II” nuclear-powered attack submarine when it passed through the South China Sea, the East China Sea, and then Taiwan.
Australian Defence Minister and Deputy Prime Minister Richard Marles declined to give more information on the incident when speaking to the ABC on Thursday.
“I won’t go into details around that, other than to say that what our military does, what our navy, does in the South China Sea is routine,” Marles told the ABC.
“It’s been doing it for decades, and it is focused on asserting the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea: freedom of navigation, freedom of overflight, the global rules-based order, which I’ve been describing as being so important for our national interest.”
However, the Minister did note the government may make a public disclosure of the incident at a later time.
“That may happen in the future again, but what we are focused on first and foremost is doing the activity because that’s in our national interest,” he said.
The Australian Department of Defense also did not confirm any details about the alleged incident to The Epoch Times.
“HMAS Parramatta is currently undertaking a Regional Presence Deployment, conducting a number of Navy-to-Navy activities with Australia’s regional partners and participating in various maritime exercises,” a departmental spokesperson said in an email to The Epoch Times.
“Regional deployments form part of Australia’s longstanding contribution to an open, inclusive and resilient Indo-Pacific.
“For operational security reasons, Defence does not publicly disclose specific details of operations.”
Leaving Australia in late May, the Australian navy’s frigate HMAS Parramatta visited Vietnam and South Korea before sailing through the South and East China Seas to Japan.
It arrived at a port in Nagasaki Prefecture, Japan, on June 28 after conducting military exercises with Japan’s Self-Defense Forces.
HMAS Parramatta arrived in Danang, a port city of Vietnam, on June 5 and left the country a week later for the Busan Naval Base, according to the Australian Embassy in Vietnam.
The jet released flares as it flew close to the side of the Australian P-8 aircraft while the P-8 was on its regular maritime surveillance flight in international airspace.
The Chinese jet then accelerated and cut across the nose of the Australian plane before releasing a “bundle of chaff” containing small aluminium pieces, some of which were “ingested” into the P-8’s engine.
“Quite obviously, this is very dangerous,” Marles said at the time.
But he noted that the incident “will not deter” Australia from engaging in surveillance activity that is “within our rights in international law.”
“Other countries do the same,” Marles said. “We are deeply invested in the rights of freedom of navigation in the South China Sea ... This is a body of water that is deeply connected to Australia because of our trade, which goes through there.”
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