BANGKOK: The United States military released a video on Monday of what it called an 'unsafe' Chinese manoeuvre in the Taiwan Strait on the weekend, in which a Chinese navy ship cut sharply across the path of an American destroyer, forcing the US ship to slow to avoid a collision.
The incident occurred Saturday as the American destroyer USS Chung-Hoon and Canadian frigate HMCS Montreal were conducting a so-called 'freedom of navigation' transit of the strait between Taiwan and mainland China.
China claims the democratic self-governing island of Taiwan as part of its own territory, and maintains the strait as part of its exclusive economic zone, while the U.S. and its allies regularly sail through and fly over the passage to emphasize their contention that the waters are international.
During the Saturday transit, the Chinese guided-missile destroyer overtook the Chung-Hoon on its port side, then veered across its bow at a distance of some 150 yards (137 meters), according to the U.S. Indo-Pacific Command. The American destroyer held its course, but reduced speed to 10 knots "to avoid a collision," the military said.
The video released on Monday shows the Chinese ship cutting across the course of the American one, then straightening out to start sailing in a parallel direction.