A U.S. and a Canadian warship sailed through the Taiwan Strait on Saturday in a rare joint mission in the sensitive waterway at a time of heightened tensions between Beijing and Washington over Chinese-claimed Taiwan.
The Navy’s 7th Fleet said the guided-missile destroyer USS Chung-Hoon and Canadian frigate HMCS Montreal conducted a routine transit of the strait “through waters where high-seas freedoms of navigation and overflight apply in accordance with international law.”
“Chung-Hoon and Montreal’s bilateral transit through the Taiwan Strait demonstrates the commitment of the United States and our allies and partners to a free and open Indo-Pacific,” it said in a statement.
The Chung-Hoon, a Pearl Harbor-based Arleigh Burke-class destroyer, is named for Gordon Chung-Hoon, who was the Navy’s first Asian American flag officer
While U.S. warships transit the strait around once a month, it is unusual for them to do so with those of other U.S. allies.
The mission took place as the U.S. and Chinese defense chiefs were attending a major regional security summit in Singapore.
At that event, U.S. Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin rebuked China for refusing to hold military talks, leaving the superpowers deadlocked over Taiwan and territorial disputes in the South China Sea.
There was no immediate response to the sailing from China’s military, which routinely denounces them as a U.S. effort to stir up tensions.
The last such publicly revealed U.S.-Canadian mission in the narrow strait took place in September.
China has been ramping up military and political pressure in an attempt to force Taiwan to accept Beijing’s sovereignty claims, which the government in Taipei strongly rejects.
