TAIPEI // A Taiwanese warship mistakenly launched a supersonic “aircraft carrier killer” missile towards China on Friday, hitting a fishing boat and killing one person.
It came as ties between Taiwan and China deteriorate.
The Hsiung-feng (Brave Wind) III missile flew about 75 kilometres before hitting the trawler in waters off Penghu, a Taiwanese-administered island group in the Taiwan Strait.
The skipper on the Taiwanese 60-tonne trawler was killed and three other crew on board, including a Vietnamese and a Filipino, were injured.
“An initial investigation showed that the incident has caused the death of the skipper,” said Taiwan’s defence ministry spokesman Chen Chung-chi.
“We apologise to the family of the skipper and would like to convey our condolences to them.”
The missile was fired during a drill at around 8.10am local time from a 500-tonne missile ship docked at a naval base in the southern city of Tsoying, and flew in the direction of China.
The Taiwanese navy said the missile went through the trawler, but did not explode or sink the fishing vessel.
Television images showed the upper part of the cabin, where the skipper was located when it was hit, scorched and destroyed.
The navy said it was not immediately clear how the missile, which has a range of 300 kilometres, had come to be launched, but suggested it could have been due to human error.
“Our initial investigation found that the operation was not done in accordance with normal procedure,” said Vice Admiral Mei Chia-shu, adding that an investigation was under way.
Helicopters and navy ships were sent to search for the missile, Vice Adm Mei said, adding that the military had reported the incident to the island’s top security body, the national security conference.
Taiwan’s mainland affairs council, which handles China policy, said it had notified Beijing of the incident through a quasi-official body.
Official communications between the council and its Chinese counterpart have effectively been frozen by Beijing over Taiwan’s new government refusing to recognise the “one China” concept.
The tenet, agreed by Beijing and Taiwan’s then-ruling Nationalists in 1992, established that there is only one China, but with each side reserving the right to interpret the concept as they see fit.
Analysts said Friday’s incident drew attention to how damaging the freeze in communications could prove.
“This event highlights the importance of communications between the two sides ... in order to reduce the possibility of any misjudgement,” said Professor Alexander Huang from Taiwan-based Tamkang University.
“Otherwise, should we wait until a big event happens?”
* Agence France-Presse
