Capri, (APP – UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News – 19th Apr, 2024 ) At the G7 foreign ministers meeting in Italy on Thursday, the United States urged European powers to increase pressure on China as Washington accuses Beijing of aiding Russia’s military expansion.
In particular, the Americans hope that European nations will pressure China to reduce military support for Russia at a time when Russian forces are asserting themselves in Ukraine after the February 2022 invasion, according to Washington.
In addition to the United States of America, the G7 countries also include Canada, Great Britain, France, Germany, Japan and Italy, which holds the presidency this year.
Foreign Minister Antony Blinken, who arrived on the Italian island of Capri on Wednesday, expressed his concerns during a working meeting on the Russian invasion of Ukraine, according to a US diplomatic source.
China is “contributing to Russia’s ability to prosecute” the war in ways that threaten all of Europe, a senior US official told reporters on condition of anonymity.
“By creating this industrial base, they are expanding Russia’s ability to manufacture equipment, to manufacture ammunition, and there should be a pause as to what that capacity will be,” he said later.
There is a “growing awareness” of the challenges of supporting China and the warning is expected to appear in a final communique on Friday, the official added.
After a meeting with Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleb on Thursday, Blinken stressed the “urgent” need to increase support for Ukraine after another Russian strike left 18 dead on Wednesday.
The US House of Representatives is expected to vote on Saturday on new military aid, including some $61 billion in long-delayed support for Ukraine.
“This is a matter of life and death,” Kuleba said, adding that he would work at the G7 meeting to secure more support for air defense, which he said was “of fundamental importance.”
– Blinken and China –
Washington has set a red line for Beijing – not to supply Russia with weapons for its war in Ukraine. And she has not yet provided evidence that this has been exceeded.
But the United States has increasingly condemned what it says is China’s backdoor support for Moscow.
The US pressure comes as Blinken prepares to visit China, a trip Washington says will come in the “coming weeks”.
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said in Beijing on Tuesday that he had asked Chinese President Xi Jinping to pressure Moscow to end its “senseless” war in Ukraine.
The issue of military support for Russia was also discussed in a recent conversation between President Joe Biden and Xi Jinping.
A senior US official said last week that China was helping Russia carry out “the most ambitious defense expansion since the Soviet era and faster than we thought possible” at the start of the Ukraine conflict.
After the U.S. findings were released, officials said China was helping Russia in a number of areas, including joint production of drones, space capabilities and exports essential to the production of ballistic missiles.
China has been a key factor in revitalizing Russia’s defense industrial base, “which has otherwise suffered significant setbacks” since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, a senior US official told reporters on condition of anonymity.
Washington said China provided more than 70 percent of the $900 million in machine tools — likely used to make ballistic missiles — imported in the last quarter of 2023 by Russia.
U.S. officials also said 90 percent of Russia’s imports of microelectronics last year — used to make missiles, tanks and planes — came from China.
lb/mm/yd
