Beijing plans to supply “weapons” to Russia to support its offensive in Ukraine, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken warned on Sunday after a meeting with his Chinese counterpart Wang Yi.
“We talked about the war being waged by Russia and the concerns we have that China is planning to provide lethal support to Russia,” he said on CBS. Asked what this would imply concretely, the head of American diplomacy replied: “Mainly weapons”.
These statements were made even as the head of European diplomacy Josep Borrell urged the Twenty-Seven on Sunday to “accelerate our military support for Ukraine”, assuring that Kiev was in a “critical” situation in terms of ammunition.
Antony Blinken and Wang Yi met on Saturday evening in Munich, on the sidelines of the Security Conference, in an exchange that American diplomacy described as “frank and direct”.
The secretary of state warned of the “implications and consequences” for China if it were found to be providing “material support” to Russia in its war in Ukraine or helping it to escape the Western sanctions, State Department spokesman Ned Price said in reporting on the interview.
The American vice-president, Kamala Harris, present in Munich on Saturday, had also questioned the neutrality displayed by China.
The United States is “troubled by the fact that Beijing has deepened its relationship with Moscow since the beginning of the war”, she stressed.
“China’s move to provide lethal support to Russia would only reward aggression, continue the killings and further undermine a rules-based order,” the vice president warned.
During this same conference in Munich, European diplomat Josep Borrell warned of the shortage of ammunition in the hands of the Ukrainian army. “It must be resolved quickly, it’s a matter of weeks,” he said.