WASHINGTON, Feb 9 (Reuters) - The U.S. House of Representatives on Thursday unanimously backed a resolution condemning the incursion of a Chinese spy balloon into U.S. airspace last week as "a brazen violation of United States sovereignty".
The House voted 419-0 for the resolution, five days after the U.S. Air Force shot down the device over the Atlantic Ocean.
The resolution is non-binding, but is intended to convey that Republicans and President Joe Biden's fellow Democrats are united in condemning the decision to send the balloon over U.S. territory.
China's foreign ministry has said it was a weather balloon that had blown off course and accused the United States of overreacting.
The resolution also denounces the Chinese Communist Party's "efforts to deceive the international community through false claims about its intelligence collection campaigns".
It adds that it should be U.S. policy to act quickly and decisively to prevent foreign aerial surveillance platforms from violating U.S. airspace and calls on the Biden administration to keep the House informed by providing comprehensive briefings on the incident.
