China's development of armaments solely for own legitimate security interests: FM spokesperson

BEIJING, Oct. 19 (Xinhua) -- A Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson on Tuesday said the sole aim of China's development of necessary military capabilities is to safeguard its legitimate security interests, refuting U.S. accusations that China's development of armaments would intensify the arms race.

The claim made by the United States purely aims to shift blames on the others and divert the attention, spokesperson Wang Wenbin said at a daily press briefing.

Wang pointed out that the United States not only owns the world's largest and most advanced nuclear stockpile, but also is investing trillions of dollars in upgrading its "nuclear triad".

Everyone knows that the United States withdrew from the Treaty on the Limitation of Anti-Ballistic Missile Systems and the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty, and constantly advances the deployment of a global anti-ballistic missile system, he said.

For a long time, the United States has been the only country obstructing the negotiations on the Biological Weapons Convention verification protocol. In addition, it stonewalls the efforts to negotiate outer-space arms control, and transfers nuclear submarines to non-nuclear weapon states, which will increase the risk of nuclear proliferation, Wang added.

"By hyping up the 'China threat', what the United States is really up to is searching for excuses to build up its military capabilities and seek the advantage of absolute security," he said.

"The U.S. side should stop hyping up 'China threat' and making issues of China, demonstrate a responsible attitude, play its due role as a major country, to work with the international community to uphold global strategic balance and stability, and achieve common security for all countries," Wang said.

Wang said that China has always kept its nuclear forces at the minimum level required to safeguard national security, and will never be engaged in a nuclear arms race with any country.

He said no country will be threatened by China's national defense capability as long as it does not intend to threaten or undermine China's sovereignty, security and territorial integrity.

"China always works to safeguard world peace, contribute to global development, uphold international order and provide public good," said the spokesperson.