US repeats call for arms control talks with China as Beijing accelerates nuclear programme
- Washington remains ‘ready and willing’ for dialogue, ‘and we’ve made that known to Chinese authorities’, says a State Department spokesman
- New Pentagon findings suggested that China is ‘leaving behind its previous nuclear doctrine of limited deterrence’
In a report released on Wednesday, defence officials warned that China’s stockpile of deliverable nuclear warheads could reach 1,000 by 2030, some five times the amount it was estimated to possess last year.
Urging nuclear-armed nations to “act prudently,” State Department spokesman Ned Price said in a briefing that the new findings suggested that China was “leaving behind its previous nuclear doctrine of limited deterrence”.
The remarks came after Beijing repudiated the Pentagon report and insisted it was committed to keeping its nuclear force at the “minimal level required for national security”.
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Highlighting previous, unheeded appeals from the US for the two sides to begin nuclear talks, Price said that Washington remained “ready and willing to do that and we’ve made that known to PRC authorities.”