The US surveillance plane that caused the crash of a Chinese military plane in the coastal area off Hainan Province grossly violated international law, according to a signed article Tuesday.
Authored by Gong Li, the article restates the whole incident. The article says that after the collision incident, the US did not make any apology to the Chinese side, but instead scrambled to find so-called legal arguments for its acts.
The US side claimed that the collision occurred in international airspace and the US plane enjoys the freedom of overflight. The US even went so far as to say that the US plane's entering China and landing at a Chinese airport were due to an emergency, and the emergency landing is international practice. The US also said that the plane is its property and enjoys sovereign immunity.
In response, the article says that the analysis of the incident from the perspective of international law can enable people to understand the true nature of the incident.
First, the collision took place in the airspace above waters close to China, which is also above China's exclusive economic zone, says the article.
According to the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea, foreign planes enjoy the freedom of overflight over a country's exclusive economic zone. However, it says, such freedom is not unlimited, as argued by the U.S., but rather conditional, it says.
According to Article 58 of the convention, foreign planes, while enjoying the freedom of overflight, should also take into consideration the rights of the country concerned, observe both the law of the specific country and international law, and are not allowed to engage in activities endangering the sovereignty, security and national interests of the specific country, the article indicates.
It points out that even US scholars agree that due to limitations set forth in Provision 3 under article 58 of the convention, the nature of overflight freedom in exclusive economic zones by foreign planes is different from the principle of freedom over international waters.
US surveillance planes, in total disregard of the repeated solemn representations made by the Chinese government, frequently approach the airspace above the sea areas close to China for reconnaissance. Such acts exceeded the "overflight freedom" principle allowed by international law and are an abuse of such a principle, the article says.
It is proper and in accordance with international law for China to follow and monitor U.S. military planes in order to safeguard its state sovereignty and security, the article stresses.
It is certain that if foreign surveillance planes are conducting spy flights in airspace over water areas close to the US, the US would not sit idle in line with the "overflight freedom" principle, it says.
Second, the article says that the entry of the US spy plane into and its landing on Chinese territory without approval are infringements upon Chinese airspace sovereignty.
The article notes that the Paris aviation covenant, the first multilateral agreement on airspace legislation in the world, stipulated principles of airspace sovereignty in 1919.
The first item of the covenant clearly expounds that all members of the agreement admit that each state enjoys complete and exclusive sovereignty in the space over its own territory.
Based on this principle, the agreement says that military aircraft of one state can not fly over or land on the territory of another without approval.
The article notes that the international civil aviation covenant of 1944 has a similar stipulation on airspace sovereignty and military aircraft.
The article indicates that it is the normal practice in international law that a state enjoys complete and exclusive sovereignty for the space over its territory, and the so-called "complete and exclusive" sovereignty means that the state can rule and control its airspace completely.
As a demonstration of China exercising sovereignty over its airspace, the 12th item of the Law on Territorial Waters and their Contiguous Areas of the PRC indicates that only through ratification or approval by the Chinese government can foreign aircraft enter the space over Chinese territorial waters.
After the collision, the communications system of the US plane still functioned well, and it had enough time to issue a request to land at a Chinese airport. However, the US plane did not send any request or notice to the Chinese side for emergency landing, the article says.
Even in ordinary cases, such acts are against international common practice, let alone the fact that the US plane is no ordinary aircraft and its flight was not the ordinary flight of a civil airplane.
The entry into China's territorial space should have been clearly approved by the Chinese government under any circumstances.
The so-called "emergency landing" can not be an excuse for the US plane to intrude into China's territory without China's permission, the article indicates.
The failure of the U.S. plane to make a request to or to inform the Chinese side was a slight to China's sovereignty. China is entirely entitled to take any just measures of self-defense to maintain its national security interests, the article says.
Third, the U.S. side, after the incident, not only failed to apologize to the Chinese side for its international malfeasance, but claimed that the U.S. plane, property of the US government, enjoys the status of sovereign immunity, and that the Chinese side had no right to inspect it.
According to international law, foreign military planes which make unauthorized landing in the territory of another country without permission does not enjoy the privilege of sovereign immunity. The United States itself also requires that foreign military planes obtain written approval before crossing into or landing on its territory. Moreover, US policy is that foreign military planes are immune from search, detention or inspections only when approval is given by the victim country, the article says.
Obviously, the whole of the collision incident took place in the exclusive economic zones of China. The US plane rammed and destroyed the Chinese plane, and illegally entered Chinese territory. As a victim, a country where the incident took place and as a country where the incident-making airborne vehicle is landing, China has jurisdiction over the whole incident and the full right to investigate the incident. This right has been attested by a long period of international practice. Relevant countries have never demurred about such a right and have never claimed any so-called "sovereign immunity," the article says.
The ramming and destruction of the Chinese military plane and encroachment upon Chinese sovereignty over China's airspace by the US military surveillance plane was an incident which grossly violated international law, it says.
The US government must take full state responsibility arising therefrom. In accordance with the principle governing state responsibility, what the US government should do first is to apologize to the Chinese government and people, and immediately halt all surveillance activities in China's coastal areas, and hold a positive attitude in carrying out a comprehensive and thorough investigation into the incident in cooperation with the Chinese government, it says.
It also urges the U.S. side to make prompt, sufficient and effective compensation for China's loss of life and property.
(People's Daily 04/04/2001)
