The United States Coast Guard encountered four vessels from the Russian and Chinese counterparts near Alaska on Saturday as they transited toward the Arctic Ocean for patrols.
A U.S. Coast Guard HC-130J long-range surveillance aircraft spotted two Russian border guard ships and two Chinese coast guard ships approximately 440 miles southwest of St. Lawrence Island in the Bering Sea, the U.S. Coast Guard said in a statement on Tuesday.
It is the northernmost location where the U.S. Coast Guard has so far spotted its counterpart from China. The four ships were sailing northeastward and were inside the economic waters of Russia, which extend 200 nautical miles beyond the country's territorial sea.
St. Lawrence Island is situated west of mainland Alaska and south of the Bering Strait, a waterway that connects the Arctic Ocean and the Pacific Ocean. The remote island, which is closer to Russia (50 miles) than to Alaska (116 miles), is just south of the Arctic Circle.
This "near Arctic" encounter came after Russia and China staged a joint coast guard drill in Russia's Far East region from September 16 to 20. They formed a task force and headed for the waters in the Northern Pacific Ocean to conduct a joint patrol afterward.
China's presence in the Northern Pacific Ocean has been growing recently. It has deployed warships and bombers near the Aleutian Islands of Alaska and in the Bering Sea, while its coast guard fleet continued to patrol the area for what it called fisheries law enforcement.
"This recent activity demonstrates the increased interest in the Arctic by our strategic competitors," said Rear Admiral Megan Dean, the commander of the 17th Coast Guard District, which has an area of responsibility that covers Alaska's mainland and islands.
"As part of Operation Frontier Sentinel, the Coast Guard meets presence with presence when strategic competitors operate in and around U.S. waters," the lead federal maritime law enforcement agency in the U.S. responded to a previous inquiry from Newsweek.
Meanwhile, the Chinese coast guard announced on Wednesday that its ships have arrived in the Arctic Ocean for joint patrols with the Russian border guard, which occurred during the national day holidays of China. Tuesday (October 1) is the country's national day.
This marked the first time the Chinese coast guard ships have entered the Arctic Ocean, a resource-rich region that is becoming more accessible due to temperatures rising at more than twice the rate of anywhere else on Earth, resulting in a decrease of sea ice in the area.
The Chinese coast guard claimed that the entry into the Arctic Ocean "has significantly expanded" its operational range, tested its ability to conduct missions in unfamiliar areas, as well as bolstered its participation in international and regional maritime governance.
China has declared itself a "near-Arctic state" even though its territory in East Asia is 900 miles away from the Arctic Circle. In August, Beijing had three icebreakers operating in the Arctic Ocean simultaneously for the first time ever, according to ship-tracking data.
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