It also accuses the United States of provoking Beijing.
Chinese Defense Minister Gen. Li Shangfu delivers a speech in Singapore on June 4, 2023. | AP Photo/Vincent ThianSINGAPORE — China’s defense minister defended sailing a warship across the path of an American destroyer and Canadian frigate transiting the Taiwan Strait, telling a gathering of some of the world’s top defense officials in Singapore on Sunday that such so-called “freedom of navigation” patrols are a provocation to China.
Additionally, the U.S. has said a Chinese J-16 fighter jet late last month “performed an unnecessarily aggressive maneuver” while intercepting a U.S. Air Force reconnaissance aircraft over the South China Sea, flying directly in front of the plane’s nose. In a wide-ranging speech, Li reiterated many of Beijing’s well-known positions, including its claim on Taiwan, calling it “the core of our core interests.”
In his speech the previous day, Austin broadly outlined the U.S. vision for a “free, open, and secure Indo-Pacific within a world of rules and rights.” “It likes forcing its own rules on others,” he said. “Its so-called ‘rules-based international order’ never tells you what the rules are and who made these rules.”Li is under American sanctions that are part of a broad package of measures against Russia — but predate its invasion of Ukraine — that were imposed in 2018 over Li’s involvement in China’s purchase of combat aircraft and anti-aircraft missiles from Moscow.
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