Washington's desperate bid to pass the buck

File photo shows the White House and a stop sign in Washington DC, the United States. [Photo/Xinhua] 

This is an editorial from China Daily.

Some US politicians and media outlets have repeatedly fabricated and spread false information to take advantage of the Ukraine crisis to smear China.

This despicable behavior does not in any way cover up the United States' responsibility for the Ukraine crisis, which it has essentially engineered as a way to weaken Russia and tighten its grip on Europe.

As a permanent member of the UN Security Council, China has always made its own judgments and it has expressed its views on the Ukraine crisis in an objective and impartial manner. It believes that the complicated historical causes of the frictions between Ukraine and Russia that the US has aggravated, exploited and lost control of cannot be resolved without a new European security mechanism that is not wedded to the divisions of the past.

As the escalation of the fighting indicates, the US-led maximum pressure tactics, including imposing sanctions on Russia and providing weapons to Ukraine, only makes the situation worse.

The most pressing task at present is to promote peace talks instead of pouring oil on the flames. China, as always, stands on the side of peace, cooperation, fairness and justice. It actively supports any effort that is conducive to easing tensions and securing a political settlement, and opposes any action to the contrary.

That is why China, shouldering its responsibilities as a major country, is doing what it can to promote talks between the two warring parties and has been in close communication with various parties trying to help promote a consensus on the way to end the fighting and how to move forward.

What China has been doing is the opposite of the malicious disinformation campaign Washington is waging against China and in stark contrast to the actions of the US, which, far removed from the consequences of its actions, continues to make trouble in its bid to profit from the crisis.

China does not support the use of sanctions, since it believes that rather than being a solution to crises, they only serve to exacerbate them at the expense of people's livelihoods.

Over the past 20 years, sanctions have been a weapon of choice for the US against various countries. Over that period, the unilateral sanctions imposed by the US have increased tenfold, according to data published by the US Treasury Department. The US imposed 3,800 sanctions on governments, individuals, organizations and market entities worldwide during the previous presidency. That's three new sanctions a day on average.

That many other countries have refused to join the Western countries in sanctioning Russia reflects their sober judgment of the situation.

The US is not in a position to dictate that China join its sanctions targeting Russia. That the US is smearing China for not doing so only exposes how it has been unable to exert control over the troubles it has orchestrated and how desperate it has become after realizing the dilemma it has created for itself.