Asked what Iran would do if a U . S . ship or plane strayed into Iranian territory, Shamkhani said, " If it's innocent passage, we would let them go.
22.
But a U . S . official speaking on condition of anonymity said the destroyer was exercising its right of " innocent passage " on its way to East Timor.
23.
It also alleged that Albania's failure to warn ships of the danger of the minefield constituted an omission that affected the rights of other states : specifically, the right of innocent passage.
24.
The strait is an international waterway, and foreign warships have the " right of innocent passage " through it under international law, Foreign Ministry spokesman Chen Jian said Tuesday at a briefing.
25.
In the subsequent incident of 1988, the same USS " Yorktown " and USS " Caron ", while claiming the innocent passage again in the Black Sea, were bumped by the Soviet vessels.
26.
Under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea however, innocent passage rules do not apply and ships both commercial and military are allowed passage as if they were traversing the high seas.
27.
Innocent passage, along with transit passage, was integrated into the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea ( UNCLOS ), which supserseded the Convention on the Territorial Sea and the Contiguous Zone.
28.
Territorial waters give the littoral state full control over air navigation in the airspace above, and partial control over shipping, although foreign ships ( both civil and military ) are normally guaranteed innocent passage through them.
29.
The vessel's charterer, the Danish shipping company Maersk, said Iran's seizure of a commercial vessel engaged in innocent passage through Iran's territorial waters in the internationally recognized shipping lane of the Strait of Hormuz was illegal.
30.
In the absence of agreements to the contrary, foreign vessels have no right of passage within internal waters, and this lack of right to innocent passage is the key difference between internal waters and territorial waters.
