2023-06-07 05:33:44
China and Russia conducted a joint military air patrol over the Seas of Japan and East China – on Tuesday – prompting South Korea to deploy combat aircraft precautionary.
“The two armies conducted their sixth joint air patrol, in accordance with the annual plan for military cooperation” between Beijing and Moscow, said the New China News Agency (Xinhua), quoting the Chinese Ministry of Defense.
Xinhua did not give any details regarding the nature of the aircraft participating in the patrol, their trajectory and their location over these vast sea areas between the Korean Peninsula, Japan, China and Taiwan Island.
For its part, the South Korean army announced the launch of fighter jets “following 4 Russian and 4 Chinese aircraft entered the Seoul Air Defense Identification Zone.”
“We have deployed fighters from the Air Force to take tactical measures in preparation for an emergency,” said the Joint Chiefs of Staff in Seoul, noting that the Russian and Chinese planes did not violate South Korean airspace.
In the context, US State Department spokesman Vedant Patel indicated that the United States is committed with Japan and South Korea on “a free and open region in the Indian and Pacific Oceans,” adding that the allies were on alert for “any action that might potentially be considered destabilizing or dangerous.” .
The Air Defense Determination Zone is a large area defined by states unilaterally, in which foreign aircraft are required to identify themselves for reasons of national security.
South Korea supported Western sanctions imposed on Russia following the start of the war on Ukraine on February 24, 2022, and sent humanitarian aid to Kiev.
China and Russia strengthened their diplomatic, commercial and military relations more than 10 years ago, and this continued following the war in Ukraine.
Beijing – which affirms its neutrality regarding the conflict in Ukraine – calls for respect for the sovereignty of states, but it has never condemned the Russian “military operation”.
At the end of last May, Chinese President Xi Jinping told Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin – who was visiting Beijing at the time – that the two countries affirm “providing firm support to each other on issues related to their core interests, and strengthening cooperation in multilateral forums.”
He added that Russia and China should “push cooperation in various fields to higher levels” and “raise the level of economic, trade and investment cooperation.”
And last February, Beijing issued a document for a “political settlement” of the conflict in Ukraine, which Western countries believed might enable Russia to keep large parts of the lands it seized from Ukraine under its control.
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