China today returned an underwater drone to the US, five days after it was seized from the disputed South China Sea leading to a major spat between the Communist giant and President-elect Donald Trump, who has adopted a tough stance towards Beijing.
"After friendly consultations between the Chinese and US sides, the handover work for the US underwater drone was smoothly completed in relevant waters in the South China Sea at midday on December 20," a brief Chinese Defence Ministry statement said without providing details.
The drone operated by a US survey ship in the South China Sea(SCS) was seized by a Chinese navy vessel which reportedly declined to hand it over despite request from the American ship.
The Pentagon also separately confirmed that the drone had been handed over by the Chinese side.
"This incident was inconsistent with both international law and standards of professionalism for conduct between navies at sea," Pentagon Press Secretary Peter Cook said in a statement.
"The US has addressed those facts with the Chinese through the appropriate diplomatic and military channels, and have called on Chinese authorities to comply with their obligations under international law and to refrain from further efforts to impede lawful US activities," he said.
The Pentagon statement said the US Navy drone was "conducting routine operations in the international waters of the South China Sea in full compliance with international law."
Initially, Chinese militarysaid the drone incident would be handled in an appropriate manner but later stated it would be "resolved successfully" after Trump accused Beijing of stealing the US drone.
The incident led to a major spat between Trump and the Communist giant.
"China steals United States Navy research drone in international waters -- rips it out of water and takes it to China in unprecedented act," Trump had tweeted.
The next day he tweeted again to say, "We should tell China that we don't want the drone they stole back - let them keep it!"
China rejected Trump's charge that it "stole" the drone, saying the device was picked up to prevent "harm" to freedom of navigation in the disputed South China Sea, from where Beijing claims the US is spying on Chinese coast.
"First of all we did not like the word stealing. This is also not accurate," Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Hua Chunying said at a media briefing yesterday.
Hua also denied US allegations that the Chinese naval ship picked the drone up and took it away despite messages from the US survey ship USNS Bowditch which controlled the drone.
Chinese state-media also attacked Trump for his tweets targeting China, saying that he lacked diplomatic experience and was unfit to lead a super power.
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"What is truly amazing about this (Trump) tweet, was the soon-to-be US president completely misrepresented what had actually happened -- that is more dangerous than funny," an editorial in the state-owned China Daily newspaper had said.
Hua, at her briefing yesterday, said, "As really what happened you can see from Defence Ministry statement that the Chinese navy found this unidentified device and examined in a professional manner to verify it."
"No matter how they see this unidentified device, most important thing is that Chinese navy took a professional and responsible decision to do this in order to prevent from causing harm to freedom of navigation," she said.
"I think this is easy to understand. Just imagine that you found something on the street and you to first check and verify it before handing it back to someone else. So I believe it is something easy to understand," Hua said.
US military said the drone was taken away from outside the nine dash line of the South China Sea.
The line in the Chinese maps indicates China's claims over the area, which is disputed by the Philippines, Malaysia, Vietnam, Brunei and Taiwan.
