US Spy Plane Incident

On April 1st, a US government EP-3 plane was carrying out routine surveillance in the skies near China's borders. However, for the 24 crew members on board and the governments of the USA and China, the following month would be far from routine. Claims, counter-claims, demands, denials and shifting blame has seen the plane remaining in China up to the present day.

The incident began when the EP-3 collided mid-air with a Chinese F-8 fighter plane - the pilot of the Chinese plane was reported missing, presumed dead, shortly after the incident was discovered. The US crew meanwhile made a safe emergency landing, unharmed and in good shape. They were intercepted by Chinese officials who took them to a nearby base until contact had been made with President Bush's administration.

The Chinese Foreign Ministry claimed that the US plane "suddenly veered towards" the F-8 fighter (http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/world/a... m). The American government meanwhile insisted that their plane had been flying on a routine path(http://www.ireland.com/newspaper/world/2... Despite the counter-claims, it was evident that negotiation would be the key to securing the return to the USA of the American crew and potentially the damaged EP-3 plane.

President Bush said that "The first step should be immediate access by our embassy staff" (http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/world/a... m) and, despite initial Chinese refusals to allow the US officials to speak with the crew (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/art... soon enough diplomatic talks had begun between American and Chinese officials. It soon emerged that an apology by the US would be the bargaining tool. President Bush refused to issue an outright apology, standing by the US position on the incident. However, he did express regret . The Chinese response was stated by Foreign Ministry Sun Yuxi that "the regret expressed by the US side is a step in the right direction to solving this question" (http://www.cnn.com/2001/WORLD/asiapcf/ea... .html), although Chinese demands for a full apology remained.

China and the US had conflicting interests regards an apology. Neither side wanted to appear to give ground to the other, yet they both appeared to want a swift end to the proceedings - a wish unfulfilled as the discussions continue to this day. On April 11th the US government wrote a letter to the Chinese government in which it said it was "very sorry" for the collision and subsequent loss of life of the F-8 pilot, which produced a more positive tone from the Chinese government (http://abcnews.go.com/sections/world/Dai... ).

Soon after, the US crew were released, and began the voyage home. However, the

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