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t is hard to imagine what China's leaders figured they had to gain by pushing through a law authorizing an attack on Taiwan if it moves toward formal independence. Beijing has been threatening such an attack for years, and the Communist Party's all-powerful leaders hardly need to get their toothless legislature's permission if they ever decide to plunge ahead with such lunacy.But it is easy enough to see what damage this gambit has already done to China's international reputation and objectives. By reminding the world that Beijing seriously thinks about launching a shooting war across the Taiwan Strait that could...

UK opposes selling arms to the PLA CONTROVERSIAL MOVE: A British parliamentary committee said that the country should not back the plan to lift the arms-sale embargo on China AFP , LONDON Friday, Mar 25, 2005 Britain should oppose lifting an EU embargo on arms sales to China if it does not receive assurances the move will not lead to an increase in weapons sales or transfer of "sensitive technologies" to Beijing, a joint parliamentary committee report said yesterday. Lawmakers cited the threat of US punitive measures, as well as China's aggressive posturing against Taiwan, as reasons to oppose a...

Japan fanned the blaze of a raging row with China on Friday, by saying the lifting of the EU arms embargo on China would be a “big problem” for Asian stability. Japan is wooing world leaders for a favorable consideration of its bid for a permanent seat at the United Nations Security Council. On Thursday, more than one million people, mostly Chinese, signed their names at the sina.com site to voice their opposition to Japan’s eligibility. Chinese Government now faces daunting pressure to be tough with Japan, analysts said. On the eve of a visit by French President Jacques Chirac,...

MEMORANDUM TO: OPINION LEADERSFROM: ELLEN BORK, Deputy DirectorSUBJECT: Human Rights and the EU Arms EmbargoFrom numerous accounts, it appears that the European Union will postpone plans to lift the arms embargo it imposed on Beijing in response to the Tiananmen Square massacre of 1989. According to the same accounts, Beijing’s enactment last week of a “law” authorizing the use of force against Taiwan tipped the scale against lifting the embargo before summer. Actions taken to exert even greater control over the Beijing-appointed leadership in Hong Kong reportedly also played a role, especially in London.Neither China’s intentions toward Taiwan, nor its...

When European unification was launched, it was thought that "ever closer union" would establish a community that would protect Europeans from political blackmail. Now we see -- though the lifting of the EU's arms embargo may now be delayed thanks to US pressure and Chinese aggressiveness -- that the EU has become merely a tool for corruption when France and China draw up joint action plans. The strategy is simple and ruthless. The world's largest dictatorship is preparing to crush and occupy the first Chinese democracy in history -- Taiwan. In order to do so, the People's Republic of China...

Bush wins big as China overplays its hand By Jim Lobe WASHINGTON - The apparent decision by European leaders to delay the lifting of their 16-year-old arms embargo on China beyond June marks a clear-cut foreign-policy victory for US President George W Bush, who made the issue a major priority in his visit to Europe last month. China itself may have inadvertently made Bush's victory possible. Its enactment last week of an Anti-Secession Law that lays the foundation for a possible military attack on Taiwan if, in Beijing's judgment, it were to move toward formal independence, gave the administration powerful...

PARIS (Reuters) - European Union countries would not start selling weapons to China if they lifted their arms embargo against Beijing, French President Jacques Chirac said in a newspaper interview distributed by his office on Tuesday. Chirac told the Japanese daily Asahi Shimbun that lifting the arms embargo, a move opposed by the United States, would also not mean any change in European policies on arms exports. His support for lifting the ban was meant to normalize relations with China, which he noted had been chosen to host the summer Olympics in Beijing in 2008 and a world's fair in...

In a blow to French President Jacques Chirac and German Chancellor Gerhard Schröder, the EU might postpone a decision on lifting the 15-year old arms embargo on China. "Europe wants to move forward on the embargo, but the recent actions by China have made things a lot more complex," a senior European official was quoted saying by the New York Times. France and Germany have been pressing hard to end the 1989 arms embargo but opposition remains in several countries traditionally close to the US. European hesitation has grown after China last week adopted a controversial law authorising an invasion...

WASHINGTON, March 21 - Yielding to pressure from President Bush and threats of retaliation from Congress, the European Union has put off plans to lift its arms embargo on China this spring and may not press the issue until next year, American and European officials said Monday. The officials said that in addition to American pressure, European nations have been shaken by the recent adoption of legislation by the Chinese National People's Congress authorizing the use of force to stop Taiwan from seceding. The Chinese action, they said, jolted France and undercut its moves to end the embargo before June....

BRUSSELS: The European Union is still working towards lifting an arms ban on China despite renewed US pressure against the move, but the timing has been complicated by recent events, diplomats said on Monday. Speaking after US secretary of state Condoleezza Rice warned that lifting the embargo would send the wrong signal to Beijing, sources said the EU move could be pushed back beyond June, hitherto the EU's target date for a decision. "The principle of moving towards lifting the embargo is not questioned," an EU diplomat said, but added that "the deadline of the end of the Luxembourg (EU)...

EUROPE is reconsidering plans to lift its arms embargo on China in the light of America’s implacable opposition and a new Chinese threat against Taiwan. Several European Union member states have got “cold feet”, making it “significantly” more likely that the EU will eventually drop its controversial plan, senior diplomatic sources have told The Times. At the very least, the decision is likely to be postponed. “Taking our time rather than rushing may not be a bad idea,” one EU official said. Last week a high-level EU delegation left Washington under no illusion that giving China access to European military...

BEIJING, March 20 -- Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice (news - web sites) sternly warned European allies on Sunday that they "should do nothing" that alters the military balance of power in Asia through sales of sophisticated weapons to China, suggesting that those arms ultimately could be directed at Americans."It is the United States -- not Europe -- that has defended the Pacific," Rice said at a news conference in Seoul before she flew to Beijing for talks with Chinese officials. Later, like two of her predecessors, she attended a service at a government-sanctioned church, making a symbolic political statement...

* Says European Union’s move to resume weapons sales to China threatens to upset the balance of power in the Pacific BEIJING: US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice suggested on Sunday that European governments are irresponsible if they sell sophisticated weaponry to China that might one day be used against US forces in the Pacific. “It is the United States, not Europe, that is defending the Pacific,” Rice said. She spoke in Seoul, the penultimate stop on her weeklong tour of Asia. South Korea, Japan and the United States are all Pacific powers and all contribute resources to keep the...

BERLIN Opposition parties in Germany are hoping to split Chancellor Gerhard Schröder's coalition in a bid to maintain an arms embargo against China, a highly sensitive issue on both sides of the Atlantic, according to senior party members. The Christian Democrats and Liberals have requested a vote in the Bundestag, the lower house of the German Parliament, which they say will test the government's commitment to human rights in China. Should the vote be successful, it could swing the mood inside the European Union. Also, the move could please the U.S. government, which is staunchly opposed to arms deliveries to...

BEIJING -- Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice suggested Sunday that European governments are irresponsible if they sell sophisticated weaponry to China that might one day be used against U.S. forces in the Pacific. "It is the United States, not Europe, that is defending the Pacific," Rice said. She spoke in Seoul, the penultimate stop on her weeklong tour of Asia

WASHINGTON - On many U.S.-European policy differences, whether in the Middle East or Iraq, Americans themselves are divided, and many even share the European view. But on selling arms to China, U.S. public and political opinion is united. No one understands why the European Union would consider selling weapons to a country that is at little risk of attack from anyone, but whose military buildup raises the danger of conflict across the Taiwan Strait and could destabilize East Asia. European leaders argue that China does not deserve to be lumped in the same category of embargoed nations as Zimbabwe and...

March 18, 2005 EU-CHINA ARMS EMBARGO A Trans-Altantic Crisis Foretold By Daryl Lindsey in Berlin China's military is already full of European technology. The lifting of the EU arms embargo may soon mean more. But not if the United States can help it; America is worried about eventually having to face those weapons in a clash with China over Taiwan. The imbroglio is threatening to become the next trans-Atlantic crisis. War has just broken out in the Taiwan Straight. Taipei 101, the world's tallest building, has sustained major damage in a horrendous bomb raid on the Taiwanese capital and Chinese...

BRUSSELS – The US ambassador to the European Union has warned that the transatlantic dispute over the EU’s proposed lifting of the China arms embargo could escalate into something "very very serious". In an interview with the EUobserver, Rockwell Schabel said, "We feel that it is the wrong thing to do and particularly now that this law has been passed", he said referring to a law passed by the National People's Congress of China authorising an invasion of Taiwan if the island seeks independence. He said it was likely that it is going to affect trade between the two sides....

Ukraine has admitted that it exported 12 cruise missiles to Iran and six to China amid mounting pressure from other countries to explain how the sales occurred. Svyatoslav Piskun, Ukraine's prosecutor- general, told the FT that 18 X-55 cruise missiles, also known as Kh-55s or AS-15s, were exported in 2001. Although none of the missiles was exported with the nuclear warheads they were designed to carry, Japan and the US say they are worried by what appears to have been a significant leak of technology from the former Soviet Union's nuclear arsenal. The X-55 has a range of 3,000 km,...

Castro Proves Embargo Foes Wrong Humberto Fontova Thursday, March 3, 2005 The hammer came down in Cuba again last month. "The Cuban state is reborn, like a phoenix with expansive wings!" Castro crowed to an "anti-globalization" conference in Havana. The crowd of 1,400 international "economists" went wild (naturally). The Maximum Leader was almost deafened by their ovation and acclaim. "Cuba's communist state is rising from the ashes of its post-Soviet economic crash with GREATER CONTROL [capitalization mine] over its economy," said a Reuters story from Feb. 14. Story Continues Below Unsurprisingly (for those who know something of Fidel Castro), Cuba...