“China Did Not Start The War”: Another Fiery Showdown At The UN Over Beijing-Moscow Relations

The United States and China once again clashed at the United Nations during a Security Council meeting, which occurred Friday. This has been a more frequent and growing trend over the last year of grinding conflict, into the Trump administration.

Acting US Ambassador Dorothy Shea accused Beijing of covertly aiding Moscow’s military machine, and urged China to “stop fueling Russia’s aggression” in Ukraine. Washington has long suspected Beijing of intentionally shipping dual civilian-military goods in order to prop up Russia’s defense industrial sector.

“Beijing’s claim to have implemented strong export controls on dual-use goods falls apart in the face of daily recovery of Chinese-produced components in the drones, weapons, and vehicles that Russia uses against Ukraine,” Ambassador Shea said.

Beijing firmly rejected the allegations, saying it enforces legal and strict controls over its exports, and has a sovereign right to trade with whatever country it likes.

China’s deputy UN Ambassador Geng Shuang reminded the US representative that Beijing is not a party to the war and has “strictly controlled dual-use materials, including the export of drones.”

“China did not start the war in Ukraine, is not a party to the conflict, has never provided lethal weapons, and has always strictly controlled dual-use materials, including the export of drones,” Amb. Shuang told the UNSC meeting.

“We urge the US to stop shifting blame on the Ukraine issue or creating confrontation and instead play a more constructive role in promoting a ceasefire and peace talks,” he added.

Of course, from China’s point of view this is brazen hypocrisy, given that the US government has sunk billions into the Ukraine conflict – not through some kind of dual use items, but through advances military systems including tanks, jets, missiles, and Patriot batteries.

The truth is that India increased its imports of Russian oil by a staggering 1,800% since before the war in Ukraine, whilst China increased its import of Russian oil by… 43% (and that’s pretty much entirely for its domestic consumption, unlike India which resells a large… pic.twitter.com/LSSNryQNMi

— Arnaud Bertrand (@RnaudBertrand) July 15, 2024

So the US is lecturing and berating others at the UN for sending potential military use industrial items to one side of the war, and all the while it remains the conflict’s single biggest military contributor, including large and constant amounts of ammo.

For this reason many pundits have called it more appropriately a proxy war which pits the US-led NATO alliance against nuclear-armed Russia. Without an off-ramp, the war could escalate into a WW3-level confrontation, many fear.