WASHINGTON: A US aircraft carrier group led by the USS Theodore Roosevelt entered the South China Sea over the weekend to promote "freedom of the seas" at a time of US concern about China-Taiwan tensions and Beijing asserting its maritime agenda.
Taiwan, meanwhile, reported an incursion of Chinese bombers and fighter jets into its air defence identification zone.
The patrol comes just days after Joe Biden was sworn in as US president and follows a year of repeated demonstrations of military power by both Beijing and Washington.
REGIONAL TENSIONS
China has complained about US vessels in the South China Sea close to islands it controls, claims, or constructed and turned into military installations.