Move likely to intensify rift between Beijing and Washington, with bilateral ties already tense over trade tariffs
The United States again flew bombers over the disputed South China Sea this week, U. S. officials disclosed Wednesday, a move likely to intensify the already fraught tension between Beijing and Washington. This is at least the second time this month the U. S. has flown bombers over the area.
China has long claimed ownership of a vast swath of the South China Sea, an important international trade route through which billions of dollars worth of cargo is shipped annually, and it holds potentially billions of dollars worth more in untapped mineral resources.
The area China claims stretches far below its southern coast, hugging and sometimes overlapping the shorelines of Taiwan, Vietnam, Malaysia, Brunei and the Philippines, all of whom have made their own, smaller, claims in the region.
