U.S. rules out returning balloon debris to China
The Hindu
Initial information gathered from the balloon, the White House said on Monday with confidence, that it is a surveillance balloon
The United States on Monday ruled out returning to China the debris of the surveillance balloon which was shot down in the Atlantic Ocean off the coast of South Carolina on Saturday.
The U.S. military intensified its efforts to collect the remnants of the high-altitude surveillance balloon from China that floated over the United States over several days last week from Montana to South Carolina.
Initial information gathered from the balloon, the White House said on Monday with confidence, that it is a surveillance balloon. It violated international law and its sovereignty, officials said.
“I know of no such intention or plans to return it," said National Security Council spokesman John Kirby, adding that the U.S. military have recovered some remnants off the surface of the sea and they are still in the process of collecting them from under waters.
Before it was being shot down by a fighter jet on Saturday, Mr. Kirby said they had gathered enough vital information about the balloon.
“We're still analysing the information that we were able to collect off of the balloon before we shot it out of the sky and now we're going to recover it and I suspect we may learn even more," he said.
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