© Reuters. FILE PHOTO: The suspected Chinese spy balloon drifts into the ocean after being shot down off the coast of Surfside Beach, South Carolina, U.S., February 4, 2023. REUTERS/Randall Hill
(Reuters) – China’s top diplomat Wang Yi said on Saturday that the United States’ handling of the balloon incident had been “unimaginable” and “hysterical”, an “absurd” act that had violated international norms.
“There are so many balloons all over the world, so the US will shoot them all down?” said Wang, director of the Office of the Foreign Affairs Commission of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee. at the Munich Security Conference.
A suspected Chinese surveillance balloon, which Beijing denies was a government spy ship, spent a week flying over the United States and Canada before being shot down off the Atlantic coast earlier this month on orders from US President Joe Biden. .
The incident, which had prompted US Secretary of State Antony Blinken to postpone a planned visit to Beijing earlier this month, further aggravated already tense relations between Washington and Beijing.
Wang was responding to questions from the Munich conference moderator about the incident, and was asked if he would participate with the US delegates present to restore the Sino-US dialogue to a more normal track.
“We call on the United States to show its sincerity and correct its mistakes, face up and resolve this incident, which has damaged Sino-US relations,” he said.
“We hope that the United States can pursue a pragmatic and positive policy towards China, and work with China to return China-US relations to the path of healthy development.”
Blinken was thought to have considered meeting Wang on the sidelines of the conference, but no such meeting had been confirmed as of Saturday morning.
Blinken will leave Munich on Sunday.
His visit to Beijing would have been the first by a US secretary of state to China in five years, and had been seen by both sides as an opportunity to stabilize bilateral ties.