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China Confirms It Has a Balloon Floating Somewhere Over Latin America

by Cobus van Staden
Selina Wang is a China-based correspondent for CNN.

China’s Foreign Ministry has confirmed Pentagon allegations that a second Chinese surveillance balloon is floating over Central and South America. Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Mao Ning said the balloon is non-military and used for flight tests. She said it has limited self-steering capacity and was blown off course, entering South American airspace “by mistake.”

The balloon has reportedly passed Colombia and is now hovering over Venezuela. These governments have so far not reacted with the same level of alarm as the United States, where the first balloon was shot down with a missile earlier this week.

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