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Blinken Says Chinese Spy Balloon Incident ‘Must Never Happen Again’

The denunciation came after Wang Yi, China’s top diplomat, called the U.S. response to the balloon “hysterical.”

Secretary of State Antony Blinken took a hard line on Chinese incursions into American airspace Saturday after a one-on-one conversation with his counterpart at the annual Munich Security Conference. “I condemned the incursion of the PRC surveillance balloon and stressed it must never happen again,” Blinken said in a tweet following the talks. Blinken’s spokesperson, Ned Price, added that China’s espionage program “has been exposed to the world,” citing evidence that it has “intruded into the airspace of over 40 countries across five continents.” The denunciation came after Wang Yi, China’s top diplomatic official, struck a different tone earlier in the day, calling the U.S. response to China’s surveillance balloon “hysterical” and a violation of international norms Saturday. “To have dispatched an advanced fighter jet to shoot down a balloon with a missile, such behavior is unbelievable, almost hysterical,” Wang said, according to Reuters. Relations between the two global superpowers have been in free-fall since the U.S. shot the down the Chinese balloon off the coast of South Carolina last month.