The Chinese government accused Pete Hegseth To try to “sow the division” in the region of Asia-Pacific about his speech at a defense conference in Singapore where he warned China was a potentially “imminent” threat.
Hegseth said on Saturday China “was crediblely prepared to potentially use military force to modify the balance of powers in Indo-Pacific”, and repeated “the real affair” of the invasion of Taiwan.
“There is no reason to cover it with sugar. The threat China The poses are real, and it could be imminent, “said US defense secretary in an opening speech to the Shangri-La Dialogue Defense Forum, calling on Asian countries to increase defense spending.
On Sunday, the Chinese Foreign Ministry condemned its words which, according to her, were “filled with provocations and intended to sow the division”.
“Hegseth deliberately ignored the call for peace and development by the countries of the region, and rather praised the mentality of the Cold War for the confrontation of the block, vilified China with defamatory allegations, and wrongly from China a threat ”,” he said.
“The remarks have been filled with provocations and intended to sow the division. China deplores and opposes firmly and protested strongly with the United States. ”
The declaration also postponed Hegseth’s assertion that China was trying to become a “hegemonic power” in the region.
“No country in the world deserves to be called a hegemonic power other than the United States itself, which is also the main factor undergoing the peace and stability of Asia-Pacific,” he said.
The ministry accused Hegseth of “playing with fire” with what he calls “the Taiwan Question “. The Communist Party leader of China (PCC) says that Taiwan is a province of China, led by separatists illegally, and promised to annex it. The democratically elected government of Taiwan and the majority of its people reject the perspective of the PCC rule.
Addressing journalists on Sunday morning, Australian Minister of Defense, Richard Marles, rejected the premise of criticism from China with regard to Hegseth.
“What we have seen from China is the greatest increase in military capacities and accumulation in a conventional sense by any country since the end of the Second World War,” he said.
“This is one of the main characteristics of the complexity of the strategic landscape with which we are all facing in the region and which is confronted in the world.”
Marles said that Australia had worked with regional partners, including the United States and the Philippines, “over a long period of time to maintain order based on global rules”, including freedom of navigation to assert the United Nations Convention on the Law.
The United States is not a signatories of this agreement.
The Shangri-La dialogue is an annual conference that welcomes dozens of leaders, ministers of defense and military leaders around the world, for three days of discussions and speeches. But a large part of the important interactions occur on the sidelines, with private meetings between the representatives. Last years have often seen American and Chinese trade beardsBut also occasionally hold important meetings, including last year With the Chinese Defense Minister Dong Jun, and the predecessor of Hegseth, Lloyd Austin.
This year, however, China only sent a small delegation led by a vice-president of the National Defense University of the Popular Liberation Army, ADM Hu Gangfeng.
On Saturday afternoon, Hu told a panel, which included the head of the British armed forces, which the speakers had tried to “provoke, separate and cause confrontations in the region” with criticism from China.
He said that the maritime situation in the region was “generally stable” but faced “serious challenges”, and accused the unnamed countries of having increased military presences and to defend the territorial sovereignty of others “in the name of the so-called freedom of navigation” and supporting the “separatist forces of Taiwan’s independence”.
China claims a large part of the Southern China Sea, where there are claims of sovereignty that overlap among several countries. He rejected a decision by The Hague that his claims are illegal.
Later on Sunday, Singapore Minister of Defense, Chan Chun Sing told a panel that it was crucial China and that the world was understood correctly. By referring to the absence of China, Chan said that Beijing should use “every opportunity” available to pass his position.
“But that China attends (dialogue), it is all for us to reach out to China in different forums … so as not to end up in a situation where the two parts interpret, poorly calculate or distort the position of the other. It is dangerous.”
