New Delhi: The Pentagon has released a selfie snapped by the pilot of a U2 spy plane that was hurtling through the skies above one of the Chinese 'spy' balloons that the US military pursued and shot down off the coast of South Carolina earlier this month. The image shows the silvery-white sphere of the balloon with panels dangling below it. The shadow of the US aircraft is seen cast over the balloon.
According to a report by The Guardian, the picture was snapped by the pilot on the flight deck as the balloon entered the airspace above the continental US at a high altitude. The selfie was first reported by CNN.
The spy balloon was first spotted by the public above Montana and tracked by US authorities as it moved across the country, causing another diplomatic showdown between the US and China.
The US military deemed it safer to destroy it when the balloon made it across several states and over to the Atlantic Ocean. It was shot down with a single missile fired from an F-22 Raptor fighter jet that took off from Langley air force base in Virginia, as per The Guardian.
The wreckage was then retrieved to assess the spying claims. Notably, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken also cancelled his much-talked-about visit to Beijing.
Blinken-Wang Yi Meeting After Balloon Gate
Last week, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Chinese top diplomat Wang Yi met on the sidelines of the Munich Security Conference amid tensions between the two nations over the balloon gate. The meeting took place at an undisclosed location for around an hour, reported AFP citing a senior State Department official.
The US warned China to not repeat its ‘irresponsible act’ of sending a ‘spy’ balloon into American airspace, reported AFP.
Blinken "directly spoke to the unacceptable violation of US sovereignty and international law by (China's) high-altitude surveillance balloon in US territorial airspace, underscoring that this irresponsible act must never again occur", State Department spokesman Ned Price said, as quoted by AFP.
"The Secretary made clear the United States will not stand for any violation of our sovereignty," he added.
Reacting to the warnings, China’s Wang Yi condemned the US reaction to the balloon as "hysterical and absurd". He said, "There are many balloons from many countries in the sky. Do you want to down each and every one of them?".
Notably, Beijing earlier denied having sent a ‘spy’ balloon stating that the large white balloon was for weather monitoring purposes.
Wang told Blinken that their countries' relations had been damaged by how Washington’s shooting down of the balloon, the AFP report mentioned.