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U.S. Sanctions of Chinese Company Unwarranted
30 June 2001
In response to U.S. decision to impose sanctions on China's Jiangsu Yongli Chemicals and Technology Import and Export Corp., the spokesperson of China's Foreign Ministry has this to say:
As a signatory to the Chemical Weapons Convention, China has always discharged its obligations faithfully and worked hard to ensure the realization of its purposes and goals.
China is against developing chemical weapons and will never assist any country in doing so. China has exercised strict export controls in accordance with the list of the Convention and relevant regulations and does not export chemicals, production know-how and equipment that can be used for the manufacturing of chemical weapons. China has also formulated relevant rules in this regard.
In explicit terms, the Convention provides for normal trade and cooperation between nations in the chemical industrial field that signatories are required to guarantee and facilitate. What the Chinese company did falls into the category of normal international trade in the chemical industrial field, and its activities do not in any way contradict the purposes and goals of the Convention.
Both being signatories, China and the United States have a duty to carry out the Convention in a comprehensive and scrupulous manner and act on an accurate interpretation of its provisions. China is of the view that no country has the right to put its domestic legislation above international law. It is utterly unreasonable for the United States to sanction the Chinese company on the basis of its domestic law and its country-specific policy. The Chinese side hereby expresses its opposition to the U.S. move and demands that the U.S. side withdraw its unwarranted sanctions against the Chinese company.
This
material is produced independently for NTI by the James Martin
Center for Nonproliferation Studies at the Monterey Institute of
International Studies and does not necessarily reflect the
opinions of and has not been independently verified by NTI or
its directors, officers, employees, agents. Copyright © 2007 by
MIIS.
