By
The Associated Press
BEIJING - American diplomats pressed yesterday for daily access to a detained U.S. air crew, while China's top military newspaper said Beijing had the right to "thoroughly investigate" the crew members.
The Liberation Army Daily also demanded an end to spy flights near China's coast. The paper's comments added to evidence that China's influential military is pushing for a hard line against Washington and might be obstructing a settlement. The newspaper is published by the military, and its contents are approved by senior commanders.
"China has the right to fully and thoroughly investigate this entire incident, including the American military aircraft and the people in charge of it," the Liberation Army Daily said. "The U.S. government should ... immediately stop all military surveillance activities off the Chinese coast."
Meanwhile, crew members of the U.S. Navy EP-3E were entering their second week of captivity on Hainan island in the South China Sea. They landed there after a mid-air collision April 1 with a Chinese fighter jet. The Chinese pilot is missing.
The EP-3E is believed to have been monitoring military radio, radar and other signals when it collided with one of two Chinese fighter jets sent to track it.
U.S. diplomats met the 21 men and three women of the air crew yesterday for a third time and said they were in "high spirits." U.S. Ambassador Joseph Prueher said diplomats were waiting for a Chinese response to a request to see them twice a day.
"(We're) hoping to get them out of here before too long," Prueher told reporters as he walked into church.
Later in the day, Prueher went to a meeting at the Foreign Ministry. Embassy officials wouldn't say who he met or what they discussed.
Chinese authorities have confirmed they questioned the U.S. crew. They accuse the pilot of breaking the law by making an emergency landing at a Chinese air base without applying in advance for permission.
The White House has declined to apologize for the incident, saying it believes the collision was an accident. But on Saturday, Chinese Defense Minister Gen. Chi Haotian said the army wouldn't let Washington "shirk responsibility." And Chinese civilian leaders could be unwilling to oppose the military on such an emotional issue for fear of looking weak before major leadership changes to be decided next year at a Communist Party congress.
A search for the missing Chinese fighter pilot entered its eighth day, though rescuers said there was little hope he had survived so long on the open sea.
Analysts have said China's military is unlikely to agree to release the Americans until the fate of its pilot is known. State media reports have mentioned his low chances of survival, possibly trying to prepare the public for declaring him dead.
"After a week, there's not much of a chance,"' said Wang Chunqiong, a fisherman in Xinhua, near Haikou, the capital of Hainan island. "Over there the waves are big. The sea is deep. It's the open sea and there are sharks."
