RIO DE JANEIRO: As tensions are running high between Washington and Beijing over the shooting down of what United States officials said was a Chinese surveillance balloon, Colombia reported having spotted a similar object in its airspace.

The national air defence system detected an object at an altitude of around 17,000 metres that had entered the country’s airspace in the northern sector on Friday morning, German Press Agency (dpa) quoted the Colombian air force as saying on Saturday.

The object had moved at an average speed of about 46 kilometres per hour, showing “similar characteristics to a balloon.”

The Colombian Air Force had tracked the object through its defence systems until it left its airspace. It had posed “no threat to national security and defence, nor to air safety,” the air force said, adding it was now working with other countries to determine the origin of the object.

The US military on Saturday shot down what officials said was a Chinese surveillance balloon off the coast of South Carolina.