At the recent NATO Summit, the 32 NATO countries labelled the PRC’s deepening strategic partnership with Russia “a cause for profound concern.” In the Washington Declaration, the NATO countries with one voice called on the PRC, “as a permanent member of the United Nations Security Council with a particular responsibility to uphold the purposes and principles of the UN Charter, to cease all material and political support to Russia’s war effort.”
But as National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan observed recently at the Aspen Security Forum, “China continues to be a major supplier of dual-use items to Russia’s war machine.”
“And dual-use items is kind of an abstract term; it’s a good Washington term. What it means: It’s the implements, it’s the instruments that go into the weapons that are killing Ukrainians and oppressing Ukraine,” he said. “And we think China should stop because we think it is profoundly outside of the bounds of decent conduct by nation-states.”
National Security Advisor Sullivan said the PRC responds in a piece-meal way to concerns over its provision of dual-use items which help build Russia’s war machine.
“We have seen them respond when we go to them to say, ‘Here’s a bank that’s facilitating a transaction. That is of concern to us.’ We have seen them respond to that,” he said. “So there are targeted ways in which they are responsive. But the larger picture continues to travel in the wrong direction from my perspective, and we have made no bones about that; we’ve been quite public and transparent about it. And, we of course say that directly to them in dialogue as well.”
The United States has sanctioned over a dozen Chinese companies over the dual-use issue. “In terms of next steps,” said National Security Advisor Sullivan, “we have been prepared to tighten the screws, to apply sanctions against specific entities and individuals, including in China, as well as in other countries. And that pattern will continue as we go forward.”
The European Union and the United Kingdom have also sanctioned Chinese companies for aiding Russia’s war against Ukraine. As U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken has said, “China can’t have it both ways. … It can’t say that it wants better relations with Europe when it is actually helping to fuel the greatest threat to Europe’s security since the end of the Cold War.”
