U.S. Protests China's Denial of Navy Ship

The Pentagon issued a formal protest to China yesterday over Beijing's refusal to allow the USS Kitty Hawk or any of the aircraft carrier's accompanying ships into the port of Hong Kong last week.

David Sedney, the deputy assistant secretary of defense for East Asia, summoned Maj. Gen. Zhao Ning, the Chinese defense attache in Washington, to the Pentagon for half an hour to make the complaint.

The protest expressed "deep regret and concerns with China's denial of diplomatic clearances" for the Kitty Hawk carrier strike group and two U.S. mine sweepers, the Patriot and Guardian, which were denied safe harbor days earlier as a storm approached and were forced to refuel using a tanker at sea.

"The denial of the USS Patriot and USS Guardian requests to refuel and avoid severe weather is contrary to commonly accepted international maritime safety protocols," the protest stated. "Such cancellations run counter to our joint interest in positively developing our military-to-military relations."

The Chinese government has provided no "satisfactory explanation" for the denial of access to Hong Kong, where many sailors' families had traveled in anticipation of a Thanksgiving reunion, Pentagon spokesman Geoff Morrell said yesterday at a news conference. The Chinese attache agreed to relay the message to Beijing but offered no further response, he said.

"It's baffling to the extent that these port calls into Hong Kong have been taking place . . . for decades," Morrell said, adding that in the past such denials occurred during tense relations between the two nations.

Port calls were suspended, for example, after a U.S. bomber struck the Chinese Embassy in Belgrade in 1999 and in the wake of the mid-air collision in 2001 between a Chinese fighter and U.S. Navy EP-3 surveillance plane, whose crew was detained by Chinese authorities after a harrowing landing on Hainan Island.

Asked whether Beijing had acted in response to a recent U.S. upgrading of Patriot missiles in Taiwan, and to Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates not notifying Chinese leaders about the move during a visit to China this month, Morrell said he had heard no such explanation. "It wasn't . . . incumbent upon Secretary Gates to relay that information," he said.

During the Gates trip, leaders discussed stepping up military cooperation and exchanges, and agreed to establish a defense hotline between Beijing and Washington. Morrell said he had "no indication" that such programs would be disrupted by the Kitty Hawk incident.