White Paper: China honors commitment to int´l arms control, non-proliferation

Source: Xinhuanet | 12-29-2006 13:46

BEIJING, Dec. 29 (Xinhua) -- China has honored its commitment to international arms control and non-proliferation, says a white paper issued here Friday by the Information Office of the State Council.

China has made sound preparations for implementing the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT), says the white paper titled "China's National Defense in 2006".

To this end, a preparatory office has been established at the General Armaments Department of the People's Liberation Army, the paper says.

With the support of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Ministry of Health, the State Environmental Protection Administration, the China Seismological Administration and other government departments, this office is responsible for setting up 11 monitoring stations in China as part of the international monitoring system, and formulating their administrative regulations and detailed rules for the implementation of the CTBT, the paper says.

Two primary seismological monitoring stations have been set up in Hailar and Lanzhou, respectively, and three radionuclide stations have been set up in Beijing, Guangzhou and Lanzhou, respectively.

The surveying of the two sites for two infrasound stations in Beijing and Kunming has been completed, and construction is scheduled to start soon. The China National Data Center and the Beijing Radionuclide Laboratory have been built, and are now in trial operation.

China supports multilateral efforts aimed at enhancing the effectiveness of the Biological Weapons Convention, says the paper.

The paper says China honors in good faith its obligations under the Chemical Weapons Convention and has promptly and completely submitted all the annual declarations, subsequent declarations regarding newly discovered chemical weapons abandoned by Japan in China and the annual national programs related to protective purposes.

According to the paper, China has also received more than 100 on-site inspections by the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons.

China fully honors its obligations under the amended Landmine Protocol to the Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons, the paper says.

The People's Liberation Army has carried out a general check of all the anti-personnel landmines that do not meet the standards of the Protocol, and has destroyed several hundred thousand old landmines in a planned way.

China has made technical modifications to usable anti-infantry land mines in inventory to make them conform to the technical standards of the Protocol, says the paper.

China opposes the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and their means of delivery, says the paper, claiming that China supports the United Nations in playing its due role in non-proliferation.

Editor:Du Xiaodan