China condemns planned US-Japanese military drills

December 2, 2010

ernational-kmcwEiidcdh.html

2010-12-02 22:40:00

Beijing, Dec 2 (DPA) China Thursday criticised planned US-Japanese military

drills while defending its push for talks on North Korea's recent aggression

against South Korea.

'Relying on a military alliance and a show of military force cannot resolve any

problems,' foreign ministry spokeswoman Jiang Yu said when asked about the

week-long drills, scheduled to begin Friday.

Jiang said China hoped the exercises would be 'calm and restrained' and said

they 'should not harm the interests of third parties, including China'.

The US drills with Japan follow smaller exercises with South Korea this week

that North Korea had warned could lead to 'full-blown war' on the Korean

Peninsula.

Since North Korean shells killed two soldiers and two civilians on a South

Korean island 10 days ago, China has called repeatedly for an emergency meeting

of envoys from six nations involved in stalled negotiations over ending North

Korea's nuclear weapons programme.

The negotiations involve North Korea, the US, China, South Korea, Japan and

Russia.

Jiang said Russia had 'expressed support' for the six-nation meeting, but she

said China was disappointed by the failure of other nations to agree to talks

after the US, Japan and South Korea all expressed doubts.

'While it seems justified for some to wield weapons, China, as host of the

six-party talks, received criticism for proposing the consultations. Is that

fair?' Jiang told reporters.

She said China had proposed 'informal' talks, 'so there should be no

difficulties' in agreeing to them.

'We hope the relevant parties will consider China's proposal positively,' Jiang

said.

China said it was concerned by North Korea's shelling of South Korea's

Yeonpyeong Island Nov 23, but it has declined to criticise its long-term ally

directly.

About 44,000 Japanese and US troops are to start Friday's drills around Japan.

The troops are to use about 60 ships and 400 planes from the two countries'

armed forces, including the US aircraft carrier USS Washington, which

also participated in the drills with South Korea, Japan's Kyodo News agency

reported.

Recommended Posts