A Chinese spy ship was spotted floating in the waters off Hawaii as the U.S. Navy led a drill involving 22 other countries, the Navy told Reuters on Sunday.
Navy officials said this isn't the first time China sent a vessel to monitor its exercise known as the Rim of the Pacific, or RIMPAC. A similar ship was seen in the same international waters in 2012. Officials also said the spy vessel, described as a Chinese Navy auxiliary general intelligence ship, posed no threat to U.S. intelligence.
"We've taken all necessary precautions to protect our critical information," Captain Darryn James, chief spokesman of the U.S. Pacific Fleet, told Reuters. "We expect this ship will remain outside of the U.S. territorial seas and not operate in a manner that disrupts the ongoing Rim of the Pacific maritime exercise."
The ship remained in international waters off the exercise site in Kaneohe, Hawaii.
China said it had the right to send a surveillance ship to watch the naval exercise, the BBC reported. According to international law, ships have the right to steer "in waters outside other countries' territorial waters," China's defense ministry said.
China sent the surveillance ship as Beijing joined RIMPAC for the first time this year, an unprecedented move.
"To my knowledge, this is the first time a nation has ever sent a surveillance ship near Hawaii while also having invited ships participating in the RIMPAC exercise," James told Reuters.
American officials hope China's involvement will help clear up miscommunications that have occurred in open waters, including a December 2013 scuffle when the two countries' vessels almost collided in the South China Sea, the BBC reported.
But experts have expressed fears China will use the opportunity to improve its own navy.
