‘Provocative move’: Chinese spy ship sighted off Queensland coast

A Chinese spy ship has been spotted off the coast of Queensland during a joint training exercise between Australian and US forces, the defence department has confirmed.

The Type 815 Auxiliary General Intelligence (AGI) vessel was sighted during war games, known as Exercise Talisman Sabre, and defence officials told the ABC’s AM program it was a “provocative move”.

A statement from the defence department confirmed that the spy ship had remained outside Australia’s territorial waters but had entered its exclusive economic zone.

However, they said the ship’s presence did not interfere with the operation of Talisman Sabre.

The three-week training exercise in central Queensland has involved more than 33,000 personnel from Australia, the United States, New Zealand, Japan and Canada.

This week a fleet of 33 warships and submarines amassed off the coast of Rockhampton for a final exercise as the war games came to a close.

“Australia respects the rights of all states to exercise freedom of navigation in international waters in accordance with international law,” the department said.

But Euan Graham, from the Lowy Institute, said the presence of the Chinese ship sent “an unfriendly message”.

“I personally am not aware of any publicised appearance of an AGI off the Australian coast before,” he told the ABC.

“Coinciding with a joint exercise with the United States, clearly that sends quite an unfriendly message ... at the moment what we see is a double standard where China picks the areas of the law of the sea that it likes and refuses to implement those that it doesn’t.”