The Ministry of Foreign Affairs yesterday welcomed an announcement by Sweden opposing the lifting of the EU's arms sales ban on China.
On June 16, the Swedish parliament voted 198 to 102 in favor of opposing the move by some EU member states to lift the 16-year-old embargo, saying that no action should be taken on the issue until China's human-rights record had improved.
The Swedish parliament cited China's threat to use force against Taiwan as one of the reasons for its opposition to lifting the ban. The embargo was put in place after Beijing's bloody crackdown on democracy activists in Tiananmen Square in 1989.
The proposal to lift the ban on military sales to China has been supported by the governments of Germany and France, among other EU states, but has met with vocal opposition from many countries and rights groups.
Sweden, Britain, the Netherlands and Denmark have all spoken against changing the EU's policy regarding the sale of military hardware to China, citing the country's habitual violation of human rights and Beijing's unwillingness to renounce the use of force against Taiwan as reasons to uphold the ban.
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