In a 1st, Chinese aircraft carrier sails between Japanese islands

By Riyaz ul Khaliq

ISTANBUL (AA) - A Chinese aircraft carrier, along with two warships, sailed between two Japanese islands, in a first such event, according to Japan's Defense Ministry.

The People’s Liberation Army’s naval aircraft carrier Liaoning and two destroyers passed between Yonaguni and Iriomote islands in the southern Okinawa province, near self-ruled Taiwan.

They sailed from the East China Sea and are headed to the Pacific.

The ministry clarified that the Chinese naval group “did not intrude into Japan’s territorial waters,” the Tokyo-based Kyodo News reported.

It comes after Japan said on Aug. 26 that a Chinese military spy plane violated its airspace for the first time as it entered Japanese airspace above the waters in the East China Sea, near islands in the southwestern province of Nagasaki.

Meanwhile, the US' Theodore Roosevelt Carrier Strike Group entered the disputed South China Sea on Tuesday.

Its transit through the Strait of Malacca follows its deployment in the Middle East amid the Israeli war on Gaza.