Japan scrambles jets against Chinese planes

TOKYO: Japan scrambled military jets on Sunday to counter three Chinese military planes that flew near Japanese airspace, defense officials said.

One Y-8 information gathering plane and two H-6 bombers flew over the East China Sea, travelling in international airspace between southern Japanese islands and went to the Pacific Ocean before returning towards China on the same route on Sunday morning, according to a spokesman at the Joint Staff of the Ministry of Defense.