The balloon that flies over Latin America belongs to China, according to Beijing

US shoots down Chinese hot air balloon 2:39

Beijing and Hong Kong (CNN) --

A balloon spotted over the skies over Latin America belongs to China and was used for flight tests, a Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman said Monday in response to questions from CNN.

It is the first time that Beijing admits that the balloon sighted over two Latin American countries belongs to China.

The balloon "seriously deviated" from its planned trajectory and crossed the skies of Latin America and the Caribbean "by mistake" due to weather conditions and the limited ability to control the ship, the spokesman for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs declared on Monday. Chinese, Mao Ning, in a regular press conference.

It is the second Chinese balloon that Beijing says strays from its route due to weather conditions, after the US military shot down on Saturday a suspected Chinese spy balloon that flew over the continental United States for days.

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"China is a responsible country. We have always strictly abided by international law. We have informed all relevant parties and properly handled the situation, which did not pose any threat to any country," Mao said, adding that all parties "expressed their understanding ".

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Both the Colombian Air Force and the Costa Rican General Directorate of Civil Aeronautics confirmed that a white observation balloon similar to the one sighted over the United States was tracked in their airspace last week, although they did not attribute the aircraft to China.

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4:41

suspicious spy balloon

A similar high-altitude Chinese balloon has been hovering over the United States for most of the past week.

It was first detected by the North American Aerospace Defense Command on January 28 as it floated east over Alaska.

The balloon then descended through Canada toward the United States, where it spent some time loitering over sensitive missile sites in Montana, according to authorities.

US authorities say the balloon was used for surveillance purposes and that the Pentagon followed it for several days as it flew over the northern United States before US warplanes shot it down over the Atlantic Ocean on Saturday.

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China expressed outrage at the downing of the aircraft and repeated its earlier claims that the balloon was for civilian use and strayed into US airspace by mistake.

Multiple US Navy and Coast Guard vessels were in the region working to recover the wreckage.

The Department of Defense has launched "a collaborative effort" with the FBI and "counterintelligence authorities" to help "categorize and evaluate the platform itself," a senior military official said.

CNN's Jamie Crawford, Aaron Pellish, Kim Berryman, Carlos Suárez, Keith Allen, Oren Liebermann and Ivana Kottasová contributed to this report.

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