DATE=10/21/1999
TYPE=CORRESPONDENT REPORT
TITLE=CHINA / U-S / INDICTMENT (L ONLY)
NUMBER=2-255312
BYLINE=ROGER WILKISON
DATELINE=BEIJING
CONTENT=
VOICED AT:
INTRO: China has strongly denied U-S accusations
that sophisticated machine tools Beijing imported from
the United States for civilian use ended up in a
missile factory, in violation of U-S law. VOA
correspondent Roger Wilkison reports the charges
involving U-S and Chinese aerospace firms threaten to
add new complications to Sino-American relations, just
as the two countries are struggling to repair ties
damaged by NATO's bombing of the Chinese Embassy in
Yugoslavia last May.
TEXT: China's Foreign Ministry says the indictment by
the U-S government earlier this week of McDonnell-
Douglas Corporation and the China National Aero-
Technology Import and Export Corporation is part of a
plot by anti-China elements in the United States.
The two firms were charged with trying to circumvent
U-S export controls. The case involves McDonnell-
Douglas' sale in 1994 of surplus machine tools to the
Chinese company for use in a joint venture to build
McDonnell-Douglas civilian airliners in China. The
United States says six of the 19 machine tools were
diverted to a factory that builds Silkworm missiles,
although U-S officials admit the diversion was
discovered before the tools were actually misused.
Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Zhang Qiyue says the
tools were manufactured in 1983 and were thus second-
hand and freely available on the international market.
Speaking through an interpreter, Ms. Zhang also
suggests that the newest U-S accusations against China
are part of a pattern.
/////INTERPRETER ACTUALITY/////
The report that the end-user of these tools is a
Silkworm missile factory in China is a fabrication
(based on) ulterior motives. I want to point out
that, since this year, the anti-China forces in the U-
S are using this alleged theft of U-S military
technology by China to start an anti-China wave.
/////END ACTUALITY/////
Ms. Zhang says the new charges follow earlier ones by
a Congressional panel -- the Cox Committee -- that
accused China of stealing U-S nuclear and missile
technology. In that case, she says, anti-China
congressmen cooked up unwarranted allegations to smear
China. She says the new charges can only do further
harm to US-China relations.
/////INTERPRETER ACTUALITY/////
This has seriously poisoned the atmosphere for
bilateral relations.
/////END ACTUALITY/////
The first ever U-S indictment of a Chinese government-
owned firm for violating U-S export controls threatens
to overshadow the visits to Beijing next week of U-S
Treasury Secretary Lawrence Summers and Undersecretary
of State Thomas Pickering. U-S diplomats are hoping
that Mr. Pickering can persuade his Chinese
counterparts to renew bilateral dialogues on human
rights and arms proliferation that Beijing suspended
after NATO bombed its embassy in Yugoslavia. But Ms.
Zhang says Washington should properly resolve the
export controls case so that it does not have an
impact on the improvement of U-S-China relations.
(SIGNED)
NEB/RW/FC
21-Oct-1999 06:33 AM EDT (21-Oct-1999 1033 UTC)
NNNN
Source: Voice of America
.
|
NEWSLETTER
|
|
Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list
|
|
|
