(Source: Times Online, UK)

China demonstrated its growing naval confidence again in the latest standoff between American and Chinese ships.

Photo Courtesy: Frederic J Browne/EPA

The fifth such incident in two months occurred on Friday in the Yellow Sea when a US Navy surveillance ship turned its fire hoses on two Chinese fishing vessels.

A spokesman for the Chinese Foreign Ministry said that the American ship was operating in China’s exclusive economic zone without permission and had violated Chinese and international laws. “We express our concern about this and demand the US side take effective measures to ensure a similar incident does not happen again,” he said.

The USNS Victorious, an ocean surveillance ship designed for anti-submarine warfare and underwater mapping, was conducting what the Pentagon called routine operations in the waters between China and the Korean peninsula. The Chinese vessels came within 100ft (30 metres) of the vessel.

The Pentagon, which accused five Chinese fishing vessels of harassing another US surveillance ship in the South China Sea near Hainan island in March, cited the incident as an example of unsafe Chinese seamanship.

The Chinese vessels did not withdraw until after the Victorious had sounded an alarm and a Chinese military ship, identified by the Pentagon as WAGOR 17, arrived in response to the call for assistance. It shone a light on the fishing vessels until they left.

The Pentagon earlier played down the confrontation, striking a more low-key tone than during the incident two months ago.

A spokesman for the US Defence Department suggested that the United States was looking to avoid the kind of angry exchanges that followed the March incident. He said: “We will be developing a way forward to deal with this diplomatically.”

It was not the first time the Victorious had encountered Chinese boats. On April 7 and April 8, Chinese-flagged fishing vessels approached the ship and the USNS Loyal as they operated within China’s 200-mile economic zone.