Bloc accused of seeking excuses for own expansion by creating rivalry
Heads of state pose for a group photo at the NATO summit in Vilnius, Lithuania, on Tuesday. (PHOTO / AP)
Beijing has blasted NATO for fabricating the "China threat" lies and for trying to expand the North Atlantic military alliance into the Asia-Pacific region.
The NATO summit on Tuesday and Wednesday in Vilnius, Lithuania, issued a communique on Tuesday, saying "China's stated ambitions and coercive policies challenge our interests, security and values".
In response, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin on Wednesday urged NATO to stop its groundless accusations and provocative remarks against the country.
We urge NATO to immediately stop smearing China, abandon the Cold War mentality and the outdated zerosum game concept, give up relying solely on military force and the mistaken belief of absolute security, and refrain from seeking excuses for its own expansion.
Wang Wenbin, spokesman for Chinese Foreign Ministry
"We urge NATO to immediately stop smearing China, abandon the Cold War mentality and the outdated zero-sum game concept, give up relying solely on military force and the mistaken belief of absolute security, and refrain from seeking excuses for its own expansion," Wang said.
On Tuesday, the Chinese Mission to the European Union said the NATO communique relating to China is dominated by Cold War mentality and ideological prejudice.
"The China-related content disregards basic facts, wantonly distorts China's position and policies and deliberately discredits China," a mission spokesperson said.
The spokesperson expressed China's deep concern that NATO, as a regional military alliance and a Cold War legacy, has been interfering in extraterritorial affairs and creating confrontation.
The spokesperson urged NATO to listen to the international community's just call for peace, development and cooperation and play a constructive role for world peace and stability.
"China will firmly safeguard its sovereignty, security and development interests, and resolutely oppose NATO's eastward movement into the Asia-Pacific region," the spokesperson said. "Any action threatening China's legitimate rights will be met with a resolute response."
NATO's eastward expansion into Asia has drawn grave concerns in the world. French President Emmanuel Macron is reportedly blocking NATO's plan to open a liaison office in Japan that targets China.
During the gathering, NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg accused China of "increasingly challenging the rules-based international order". Stoltenberg met on Wednesday morning with leaders of Australia, Japan, New Zealand and South Korea, clearly with an aim at China.
Paul Keating, former Australian prime minister from 1991-96, praised Macron for "doing the world a service by putting a spoke in Stoltenberg's wheel".
"Exporting that malicious poison to Asia would be akin to Asia welcoming the plague upon itself," he wrote in an op-ed published on Monday in the Pearls and Irritations, an Australian platform.
He called Stoltenberg the "supreme fool" of "all the people on the international stage".
"Stoltenberg, in his jaundiced view, overlooks the fact that China represents 20 percent of humanity" and possesses one of the largest economies in the world, Keating wrote. " (China) has no record of attacking other states, unlike the United States, whose bidding Stoltenberg is happy to do."
'American agent'
Stoltenberg "conducts himself as an American agent more than he performs as a leader and spokesperson for European security", he wrote.
Peter Cronau, an investigative journalist in Australia and a producer at the Australian Broadcasting Corp, tweeted on Tuesday, "Keating is only saying what the majority of Australians are thinking: A US war against China, no thanks."
NATO's eastward expansion in Europe since the 1990s has been viewed by many as a trigger for the current Russia-Ukraine conflict.
In an op-ed titled "The Indo-Pacific is no place for NATO", Yelena Biberman, an associate professor of political science at Skidmore College, New York State, cited the letter CIA Director William Burns wrote in 2008 to then-US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice when he was former US ambassador to Russia. It said: "Ukrainian entry into NATO is the brightest of all redlines for the Russia elite."
Jan Oberg, director of the Transnational Foundation for Peace and Future Research, a Sweden-based think tank, told Xinhua News Agency in a recent interview, "I think it (is) of paramount importance that NATO's policies are one gross violation of its own charter and international law."
He said that NATO's 1949 treaty, with Article 5 about mutual defense among its European members, was "distinctly defensive in nature", but the bloc is violating its own treaty "daily" and is expanding globally.
