Moscow and Beijing yesterday lashed out at Washington’s new anti-Russian sanctions that also target China for the first time, warning the US could face consequences.
The US is “playing with fire,” Russian Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Sergei Ryabkov said, while Beijing voiced “strong indignation” over the move.
China on Thursday got caught up in the sanctions war against Russia after the US announced a raft of measures that would punish third countries for dealing with Moscow.
Photo: AFP
Stepping up pressure on Moscow over its “malign activities,” the US Department of State said it was placing financial sanctions on the Equipment Development Department of the Chinese Ministry of Defense and its top administrator for its purchase of Russian Sukhoi Su-35 fighter jets and S-400 surface-to-air missile systems.
Beijing yesterday urged the US to withdraw the sanctions or “bear the consequences.”
“The US actions have seriously violated the basic principles of international relations and seriously damaged the relations between the two countries and the two militaries,” Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesman Geng Shuang (耿爽) said, adding that Beijing had lodged an official protest with the US.
US officials said it was the first time a third country has been punished under the sanctions legislation for dealing with Russia.
Moscow said Washington was rocking global stability and said sarcastically that placing sanctions on Russia has become Washington’s favorite “pastime.”
“It would be good for them to remember there is such a concept as global stability, which they are thoughtlessly undermining by whipping up tensions in Russian-American ties,” Ryabkov said. “Playing with fire is silly; it can become dangerous.”
The state department also announced it was placing 33 Russian intelligence and military-linked actors on its sanctions blacklist.
All of them have been on previous US sanctions lists.
US officials said that Washington could consider similar action against other countries taking delivery of Russian fighter jets and missiles.
Turkey is in talks to buy S-400 missile systems from Russia.
Ryabkov reiterated that none of the rounds of sanctions had forced Russia to change its course.
For all of Russia’s upbeat rhetoric, the new measures could hurt the nation’s struggling economy.
Arms exports are an important source of revenue for the nation, and last year Russia sold more than US$14 billion of arms overseas.
China’s equipment department and its director, Li Shangfu (李尚福), became targets after taking delivery over the past year of the jets and missiles from Rosoboronexport, Russia’s main arms exporter already on the US blacklist for its support of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s regime.
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