_Navy seizes UUV, likely a Chinese Sea Wing, that experts say could be used to plot routes for military subs_
An Indonesian fisher has found what experts say is likely to be a Chinese submarine drone in waters on a strategic maritime route from the South China Sea to Australia.
According to Indonesian media the unmanned underwater vehicle (UUV) was found on 20 December near Selayar Island in South Sulawesi. Six days later it was handed to police and then transferred to the Indonesian military.
Military observers have said the drone appears to be a Chinese Sea Wing (or Haiyi) UUV. The underwater glider was developed by the Shenyang institute of automation at the Chinese Academy of Sciences, and is publicly described as collecting data including seawater temperature, salinity, turbidity and oxygen levels. Information on currents and movement direction are transmitted in real time.
The Chinese central government has not commented.
China has been accused of expansionist activities in the disputed South China Sea and has conducted widespread oceanographic research in regions believed to be militarily significant. In 2019 China conducted ocean surveys to the north of Papua New Guinea, where the US and Australia operate a joint naval base on Manus Island, and in March this year near Christmas Island, an Australian territory north-west of the main continent. Submarines are known to regularly transit in the area, the ABC reported at the time.
An Indonesian security analyst, Muhammad Fauzan, told the ABC the drone was most likely mapping future submarine routes, given it was found far from Chinese waters and in a significant maritime route between China and Australia’s northernmost city of Darwin.
Fauzan said there were significant questions around whether the drone, if a Chinese instrument, was being used for intelligence gathering or illegal surveying.
“It is at least the third time that such a drone, which I and many people including experts believe was a Chinese-made underwater drone, [has been] found in Indonesian territorial waters,” he said.
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