Are you suggesting a Possible Hostage Situation Again like what took place in Iran?
Jiang again demands U.S. apology
Wednesday, April 04, 2001 08:33 AM EDT
HONG KONG, Apr 04, 2001 (United Press International via COMTEX) -- Chinese
President Jiang Zemin again demanded Wednesday that the United States apologize
for the collision between a U.S. Navy spy jet and a Chinese fighter jet, even as
President George W. Bush warned that any further delay in returning the plane
and its 24 crew members could undermine bilateral relations.
Jiang insisted the United States "should bear all responsibilities for the
consequence of the incident,'' the Xinhua news agency quoted him as saying
shortly before he left China for a six-nation tour of Latin America.
Jiang also instructed that the search for the missing pilot, Wang Wei, should
continue "at any price."
The Chinese navy and the Guangzhou Marine Salvation Bureau sent ships and planes
southeast of Hainan Island, in the South China Sea, where the incident took
place Sunday, said Xinhua. By late Tuesday, China had sent 29 ships and 37
planes to search and rescue the pilot.
China's Ministry of National Defense expressed "China's indignation and
condemnation" as it blamed the Navy jet for causing the collision, said Xinhua.
"The U.S. plane made a sudden movement toward the Chinese planes," said a
ministry spokesman. "The U.S. plane's nose and left wing rammed the tail of one
of the Chinese planes, causing it to lose control and plunge into the sea."
"It is entirely justified and in line with international laws for Chinese
fighter jets to track and monitor those U.S. planes," the spokesman added.
Secretary of State Powell insisted the United States has nothing to apologize
for, and reiterated Tuesday, in the strongest terms used by officials to date,
that Washington demanded the immediate return of the Navy plane and its crew.
Powell called the continued detention of the crew unacceptable, and said the
United States would put increasing pressure on the Chinese until they were
released.
"We did not do anything wrong. Our airplane was in international airspace, an
accident took place ... there is nothing to apologize for."
Commenting on reports that the Chinese have described the crew as being held in
protective custody, Powell said: "If the Chinese say they are being protected I
don't know from what."
"In my judgment, they're being detained," he added. "They're being held
incommunicado, under circumstances which I don't find acceptable."
Powell's comments echo growing U.S. impatience with the refusal of the Chinese
to return either the crew or the EP-3 plane -- packed with secret American
surveillance technology -- which made an emergency landing at a Chinese air base
at Lingshui on Hainan Island, following the collision with a Chinese fighter jet
sent to intercept it.
"We have waited for the Chinese government to do the right thing. But now it is
time for our servicemen and women to return home,'' President Bush said earlier
Tuesday.
Bush said the crew was well, but urged the Chinese not to make an accident into
an incident by continuing to hold the plane.
Pentagon officials said they were concerned the aircraft would never be
returned. They speculated that China would say it is holding it as evidence of
U.S. violation of international law.
A Pentagon spokesman said the crew was trained in "emergency destruction
procedures" to be able to destroy sensitive equipment to prevent it from falling
into unauthorized hands.
The crew had only about 15 minutes between the collision and the landing on
Hainan Island to disable the equipment, a pre-planned prioritized process that
includes the shredding of classified paper, erasing of computer hard-drive
memory, and the physical destruction of equipment.
Because the aircraft was damaged sufficiently to force an emergency landing, it
was likely a bumpy and hazardous descent to the ground during which the crew
would be strapped in for their own safety, limiting their movements, a former
Pentagon official told United Press International.
The Pentagon does not yet know how far through that checklist the crew got
before the plane landed and was boarded by the Chinese.
However, CNN reported that a final radio transmission from the crew after
landing said they were only then beginning the procedure of destroying
classified equipment on the plane. Since the Chinese boarded the aircraft
immediately thereafter, this would make it unlikely that they would have been
able to do much.
This diplomatic standoff has shaped up as Bush's first major foreign policy
crisis, which comes at a time of increasing tensions between Washington and
Beijing.
Relations chilled markedly last month, when Bush refused to give visiting
Chinese Vice Premier Qian Qichen assurances that the United States would not
sell high-tech warships to Taiwan in the annual April arms deal between
Washington and Taipei.
The Bush administration considers China a strategic adversary, not a strategic
partner. The warships are equipped with the Navy's most advanced anti-missile
radar system, called Aegis, and could be used to shoot down Chinese ballistic
missiles.
Asked if he thought if the political fallout from the incident could affect U.S.
plans for weapons sales to Taiwan, Powell said the two issues were not
connected. The United States regarded the arms sales "in the context of our
obligations to Taiwan," he told reporters.
The EP-3 Aries II aircraft is one of the most secret pieces of equipment in the
U.S. military arsenal. The Navy owns only about a dozen of the aircraft. Each
one carries a huge collection of highly classified sensitive radio receivers and
high-gain dish antennae that can detect, record and analyze electronic emissions
from deep within enemy territory, according to the Navy.
The EP-3 could not have landed in a better place for China or a worse one for
U.S. military intelligence. Hainan island is host to one of China's largest
electronic-signals-intelligence complexes and is manned by experts who will now
be able to gather critical information on the aircraft's capabilities, Pentagon
sources said.
(Katherine Arms in Hong Kong, Eli J. Lake at the State Department and Pamela
Hess at the Pentagon contributed to this report)
Copyright 2001 by United Press International.
News provided by COMTEX
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