China and the U.S. Hold Arms Control Talks? Chinese Side Responds

【Global Times Report by reporters Li Meng and Chen Qingqing】“We hope the U.S. side will align with the expectations of the international community, restore strategic stability dialogue with Russia, and discuss the follow-up arrangements for the New START Treaty.” Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Mao Ning made this statement on the "China-U.S. arms control talks" on the 24th, stating that during the high-level meeting of the disarmament negotiation conference in Geneva, the Chinese delegation is willing to maintain communication with delegations from various countries to exchange views on the work of the disarmament conference, the review conference of the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, and other issues. She emphasized that the U.S., as a country with a large nuclear arsenal, should fulfill its special priority responsibility for nuclear disarmament, which is a consensus of the international community.

The British Guardian reported that U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for Arms Control and Nonproliferation Mallory Stewart met with the Russian delegation on the 23rd and is scheduled to meet with China and other delegations in Geneva on the 24th. A U.S. official told AFP that after the New START Treaty expired on the 5th of this month, the U.S. held "preparatory" meetings with Russia and China in Washington, and the talks in Geneva are "more substantive." According to the Associated Press, in recent weeks, the U.S. has communicated "multiple times" with the UK and France regarding nuclear weapons issues.

Stewart accused China of significantly expanding its nuclear arsenal and conducting secret nuclear tests during the disarmament negotiation conference in Geneva on the 23rd. Chinese disarmament ambassador Shen Jian rebutted that the U.S. accusation of China conducting nuclear explosion tests is baseless and is merely an excuse for the U.S. to restart its own nuclear tests. China urges the U.S. to reaffirm the five nuclear powers' commitment to "suspend nuclear tests" and uphold the global consensus on banning nuclear tests.

Stewart claimed that the New START Treaty has flaws, as it does not take into account China's "opaque nuclear weapons development," and absurdly asserted that China is rapidly approaching the treaty's limit on nuclear warheads, predicting that by 2030, it will have enough fissile material to produce over a thousand nuclear warheads.

Military expert Zhang Junsha stated in an interview with Global Times reporters on the 24th that the U.S. request for China to join nuclear disarmament talks is an excuse for its own expansion of the nuclear arsenal. According to the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists' assessment, by the end of 2024, China is expected to have about 600 nuclear warheads, less than 1,000; while the number of nuclear warheads for both the U.S. and Russia is around 5,000.

Zhang Junsha believes that the U.S. push for China to join the talks aims to curb China's self-defense nuclear capabilities and find an excuse for its withdrawal from the international nuclear mechanism. Russia has also questioned that if the U.S. is sincere, it should include the UK and France in the negotiation framework. He stated that China is the last of the five permanent members of the UN Security Council to possess nuclear weapons, the only one that has committed not to use nuclear weapons first and not to use nuclear weapons against non-nuclear states, and has always adhered to the principle of minimum deterrence, using nuclear weapons solely for self-defense. “The disparity in nuclear capabilities among the U.S., Russia, and China is significant; under such severe inequality in nuclear forces, the U.S. request for China to join the talks has neither a realistic basis nor a moral justification.”