US President-elect Donald Trump has accused China of “unprecedented” act over the seizure of an American underwater drone in the South China Sea.
The unmanned underwater vehicle (UUV) was taken on Thursday from waters near a US oceanographic research vessel.
Trump hastily tweeted out a misspelled commentary in early hours of Saturday morning and accused Beijing of “stealing” American property.
“China steals United States Navy research drone in international waters – rips it out of water and takes it to China in unprecedented act,” he tweeted.
The message with misspelling was later deleted and another message with the correct spelling of “unprecedented” was reissued.
Military officials from both countries had been in touch to “appropriately” resolve the issue, according to Chinese Foreign Ministry.
Shortly after Trump issued the message, the Chinese Defense Ministry accused the US of “hyping up” the issue and warned Washington that the Chinese Navy will remain on alert and will take necessary steps to deal with these sort of activities.
Outgoing President Barack Obama avoided passing any comment about the issue at his end-of-year press conference on Friday.
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