The Chinese Foreign Ministry issued a statement stating that the extension by Russia and the United States of the Strategic and Offensive Arms Reduction Treaty (START-3) is an extremely important measure, but it is not enough.
“Firstly, I would like to say that China welcomes the extension of START-3, which was an extremely important step that the United States opposed during the Donald Trump administration. Secondly, we do not believe that this is enough, because even after the extension of START- 3 The United States and Russia collectively possess more than 90 percent of the nuclear weapons existing on Earth, "said Fu Cong, Director of the Arms Control Department of the Chinese Foreign Ministry, speaking at a briefing.
According to him, Moscow and Washington must reduce the number of their nuclear weapons "in an irreversible and legally binding manner." This means that the countries possessing nuclear weapons should not only reduce their operational deployment, since in this case such weapons still remain available, but should destroy the warheads. "For us, this is not a real reduction. When we talk about reduction, it must be destruction," Fu said.
According to him, "if the two nuclear superpowers continue to reduce their nuclear arsenal and reduce it to our level, then we will be happy to join the nuclear negotiations, we have said this many times, this is our position."
Also, the diplomat stressed, the PRC intends to continue to adhere to the principle of not using nuclear weapons first, as well as maintaining its arsenal at the minimum level, which is necessary only for national security and deterrence.
The START-3 Treaty entered into force on February 5, 2011. The agreement provides for the reduction of deployed nuclear warheads to 1,550 units, ICBMs, ballistic missiles of submarines and heavy bombers to 700 units, and deployed and non-deployed launchers to 800 units. The treaty was renewed for five years in early 2021, shortly after Joseph Biden came to the White House.
According to research by the Stockholm Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), as of mid-2021, the total number of nuclear weapons in the world is 13,080 warheads. More than 90 percent of this amount belongs to Russia and the United States, the rest is divided among themselves by Great Britain, Israel, India, China, Pakistan, North Korea and France.
bbabo.Net