China: Arms Control and Disarmament
These excerpts are the official Chinese position on nuclear
weapons disarmament, from a "White Paper" issued November 1995 by
the Information Office of the People's Republic of China:
"CHINA: ARMS CONTROL AND DISARMAMENT" ...
VI. Actively Promoting International Arms Control and Disarmament
China has always held that common effort by all nations is
necessary to realize disarmament and safeguard world peace. It
has long stressed and supported international community's
sustained efforts to promote arms control and disarmament. Since
China was restored to its rightful seat in the United Nations in
1971, it has even more actively participated in international
arms control and disarmament activities.
In international disarmament activities China has consistently
given active support to reasonable disarmament proposals and
initiatives by the Third World countries. In the early 1970s,
China supported the proposal by Sri Lanka and other countries
that the Indian Ocean be designated a Zone of Peace. In 1973,
China signed the Additional Protocol II of the Treaty for the
Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons in Latin America and the Caribbean
(Treaty of Tlatelolco) and in 1987 the relevant protocols of the
South Pacific Nuclear-Free Zone Treaty (Treaty of Rarotonga).
China has always respected and supported the demands of the
countries concerned for the establishment of nuclear-weapon-free
zones on the basis of voluntary consultation and agreement and in
accordance with actual local circumstances. Given this consistent
position, China welcomes the African Nuclear-Weapon-Free Zone
Treaty agreed upon by the African nations, and supports the
proposal by relevant nations on the establishment of nuclear-free
zones in the Korean Peninsula, South Asia, Southeast Asia and the
Middle East. Correspondingly, China holds bilateral consultations
with various nations on arms control and disarmament issues,
either on regular or ad hoc basis.
China has acceded to a series of major international arms
control and disarmament treaties and conventions, including the
Protocol for the Prohibition of the Use in War of Asphyxiating,
Poisonous or Other Gases, and of Bacteriological Methods of
Warfare, the Convention on Prohibition or Restriction on the Use
of Certain Conventional Weapons Which May Be Deemed to Be
Excessively Injurious or to Have Indiscriminate Effects, the
Antarctic Treaty, the Treaty on Principles Governing the
Activities of States in the Exploration and Use of Outer Space,
Including the Moon and Other Celestial Bodies, the Convention on
the Prohibition of the Development, Production and Stockpiling of
Bacteriological (Biological) and Toxin Weapons and on Their
Destruction, the Treaty on the Prohibition of the Emplacement of
Nuclear Weapons and Other Weapons of Mass Destruction on the
Seabed and the Ocean Floor and in the Subsoil Thereof, and the
Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons. China is also
signatory to the Convention on the Prohibition of the
Development, Production, Stockpiling and Use of Chemical Weapons
and on Their Destruction. China attaches great importance to the
active role these international legal documents play in promoting
international arms control and disarmament and has earnestly and
conscientiously fulfilled its own obligations under the
agreements. A Chinese delegation is currently actively
participating in the negotiation on the Comprehensive Nuclear
Test Ban Treaty and the Convention on Banning the Production of
Fissile Materials for Nuclear Weapons or Other Nuclear Explosive
Devices .
...
As early as 1963, the Chinese government issued a statement
calling for the complete, thorough, utter and resolute
prohibition and destruction of nuclear weapons. China has
persistently exercised great restraint in the development of
nuclear weapons and its nuclear arsenal has been very limited. It
has developed nuclear weapons for self-defence, not as a threat
to other countries. It has not joined and will not join in the
nuclear arms race and has consistently maintained restraint over
nuclear testing.
The Chinese government has from the beginning opposed nuclear
blackmail and the nuclear deterrent policy. On October 16, 1964,
the Chinese government offered a solemn proposal: a summit
conference be held to discuss the complete prohibition and
thorough destruction of nuclear weapons and that nuclear-weapon
states commit themselves not to use nuclear weapons against
non-nuclear-weapon states and nuclear weapon-free zones or
against each other. From the first day it gained nuclear weapons,
China has solemnly undertaken not to be the first to use nuclear
weapons at any time and in any circumstance and unconditionally
not to use or threaten to use nuclear weapons against
non-nuclear-weapon states or nuclear-weapon-free zones. China as
a nuclear weapon state never shies away from its due obligations,
advocating that nuclear-weapon states should undertake not to be
the first to use nuclear weapons and repeatedly proposing that
nuclear-weapon states negotiate and conclude an international
treaty on the no-first-use of nuclear weapons against each other.
In January 1994, China formally presented a draft for the Treaty
on the No-First-Use of Nuclear Weapons to the United States,
Russia, Britain, France and other countries, proposing that the
five nuclear-weapon states hold first-round discussions on the
treaty in Beijing as soon as possible. On April 5, 1995, China
made another official statement, reiterating its unconditional
provision of "negative security assurance" to all
non-nuclear-weapon states, at the same time undertaking to
provide these nations with "positive security assurance." These
positions taken by China have won the support of a great many
countries without nuclear weapons.
China advocates prevention of the proliferation of nuclear
weapons as part of the process of eliminating such weapons. In
May 1996, at the Conference on the Review and Extension of the
Treaty on the NonProliferation of Nuclear Weapons, China
supported the decision to indefinitely extend the treaty and the
three decisions on the principles and objectives for nuclear
non-proliferation and disarmament, on enhancing the review
process of the treaty and on the Middle East Nuclear-Weapon Free
Zone. China holds that the results of the conference accord with
the interests of all the parties to the treaty and will help
maintain world peace, security and stability.
China believes that the indefinite extension of this treaty
reaffirms the objectives of international cooperation in nuclear
disarmament, the prevention of nuclear proliferation and the
promotion of the peaceful use of nuclear energy and should not be
interpreted as permitting the nuclear-weapon states to retain
possession of nuclear weapons forever.
During the cold war, China resolutely opposed the arms race
between the two superpowers, the United States and the Soviet
Union, and stressed that the key to success in disarmament laid
in the two superpowers taking real action on their own
initiative. In 1978 at the First Special Session on Disarmament
of the United Nations, China proposed that, as the two
superpowers had more nuclear and conventional arms than any other
country, they must take the lead in disarmament. In 1982 at the
Second Special Session on Disarmament of the United Nations,
China went a step further by putting forth a concrete proposal:
The United States and the Soviet Union should stop testing,
improving and producing nuclear weapons and should take the lead
in drastically reducing their stockpiles of all types of nuclear
weapons and means of delivery. China's proposal that the "two
superpowers take the lead" met with uniform approval from the
international community and has played an active role in
promoting negotiations between the two nations, creating actual
progress towards disarmament.
In an effort to step by step realize the objective of building
a world free from nuclear weapons, in 1994 China put forward a
complete, interrelated proposal for the nuclear disarmament
process at the 49th Session of the UN General Assembly. All
nuclear-weapon states should declare unconditionally that they
will not be the first to use nuclear weapons and immediately
begin negotiations towards a treaty to this effect; efforts to
establish nuclear-weapon-free zones should be supported and
guarantees given not to use or threaten to use nuclear weapons
against non-nuclear-weapon states or nuclear-weapon-free zones; a
comprehensive nuclear test ban treaty be negotiated and concluded
no later than 1996; the major nuclear powers should implement
existing nuclear disarmament treaties as scheduled and further
substantially reduce their nuclear weapon stockpiles; a
convention banning production of fissile materials for nuclear
weapons be negotiated and concluded; a convention prohibiting all
nuclear weapons be signed, whereby all nuclear-weapon states
undertake to completely destroy existing stocks of nuclear
weapons under effective international supervision; prevent the
proliferation of nuclear weapons while promoting nuclear
disarmament process and international cooperation in peaceful
uses of nuclear energy.
Nuclear disarmament and conventional disarmament have all
along been the two priority tasks in the sphere of disarmament.
In 1986, China presented two proposals on nuclear and
conventional disarmament for the first time at the UN General
Assembly, pointing out that the United States and the Soviet
Union had special responsibilities both for nuclear and
conventional disarmament. Subsequently, for five years China had
presented these two proposals to the First Committee of the UN
General Assembly, and they had been adopted by consensus. This
action on China's part played an important role in generating
real progress in nuclear and conventional disarmament in the late
1980s and early 1990s.
China opposes the arms race in outer space. Beginning in 1984,
it has on numerous occasions proposed to the UN General Assembly
draft resolutions on preventing such arms race. China maintains
that outer space belongs to all mankind and should be used
exclusively for peaceful purposes. No country should develop any
kind of weapon to be used in outer space: outer space should be
kept "weapon free."
......
The remainder of the white paper, "China: Arms Control and
Disarmament," can be obtained from:
Lu Wenxiang, First Secretary (Press)
Chinese Embassy
2300 Connecticut Ave NW,
Washington DC 20008
phone: 202-328-2580; fax: 202-588-0032;
email: minggang@china-embassy.org
The Contents for the full White Paper starts below:
Information Office of the State Council of the People's Republic of China
November 1995, Beijing
Contents
Forward
I. Promoting Peace and Development for All Mankind
II. Military Personnel Reduced by One Million
III. Maintaining a Low Level of Defence Spending
IV. Peaceful Uses for Military Industrial Technologies
V. Strict Control over the Transfer of Sensitive MAterials and Military Equipment
VI. Actively Promoting International Arms Control and Disarmament
Concluding Remarks
Current Events | Proposition One