PLA criticizes U.S. warplane's flight over Taiwan Straits

The Taipei 101 skyscraper in Taipei, Southeast China's Taiwan. (Photo/Xinhua)

The People's Liberation Army said on Monday that it tracked a United States anti-submarine warplane that flew across the Taiwan Straits on Monday.

The warplane's flight "threatened the peace and stability across the Straits", the PLA said.

Senior Colonel Shi Yi, spokesman for the PLA Eastern Theater Command, said in a statement that a U.S. P-8A anti-submarine patrol aircraft flew over the Straits and that the U.S. publicly hyped it up.

"The theater command organized troops and tracked and monitored the whole flight, and it has everything under control," he said.

The spokesman expressed firm opposition to the flight, "which deliberately damaged the regional situation and jeopardized peace and stability across the Taiwan Straits".

Shi warned that the theater command's troops "remain on high alert to resolutely safeguard national sovereignty and territorial integrity".