Envoy: Crucial crossroads for arms control

As the international security situation becomes increasingly complicated and unsettled, a Chinese envoy warned that international arms control and disarmament has come to a crucial crossroads.

Fu Cong, head of the Department of Arms Control of the Chinese Foreign Ministry, made the remarks on Friday at a plenary meeting of the First Committee of the General Assembly at United Nations headquarters in New York.

Fu said the United States, in a "desperate attempt" to gain security supremacy over others, continuously lowers the threshold for the use of nuclear weapons, turning outer space and cyberspace into new battlegrounds. "Such acts have severely undermined global strategic stability and increased the risk of a nuclear war."

"Withdrawalism" by the United States is rampant, he said. As the US scrapped the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty, while the future of New START, the nuclear arms reduction treaty between the US and Russia, remains uncertain, "the international security situation is plagued with unprecedented uncertainties", he said.

He condemned breaches of commitments and abuses of maximum pressure by the US which have escalated the Iran nuclear issue, and pushed the security situation in the Middle East to a breaking point.

Military applications of new, advanced technologies are having a profound impact on global security, giving rise to ethical and legal concerns, he said.

Fu reiterated that China will continue upholding multilateralism and further developing the multilateral arms control system.

Fu called on all states to firmly commit to maintaining the authority and effectiveness of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and strengthening the implementation mechanism of the Chemical Weapons Convention.

"China strongly urges the US to earnestly fulfill its treaty obligations and destroy its chemical weapons stocks as soon as possible," he said.

He said China will keep making efforts to maintain global strategic stability and carry forward nuclear disarmament step by step.

"China deeply regrets US withdrawal from the INF Treaty. China firmly opposes US attempts to deploy intermediate-range missiles in the Asia-Pacific region," Fu added.

Fu called on countries to abandon the Cold War mentality, and jointly maintain strategic balance and stability to reduce the risk of nuclear war.

"All nuclear weapon states should pledge no first use of nuclear weapons, take measures to reduce the role of nuclear weapons in their national security policies and provide effective security assurances to non-nuclear-weapon states," he said.

Fu stressed the need to resolve proliferation issues through political and diplomatic means.

"Given the complexities of proliferation-related issues, they can only be properly resolved through dialogue and cooperation," he said. "Attempts to impose one's demands on others while ignoring others' legitimate concerns by means of unilateralism and maximum pressure will only make issues more complicated and intractable, which serves no state's interests."

He asked for efforts to advance governance in strategic new frontiers for the purpose of peaceful development.

"China has always been firmly opposed to the weaponization and arms race in outer space. It is deeply concerned about attempts by the US to dominate outer space," he said.