China Willing to Open Dialogues with US on NMD

China is willing to conduct "serious" dialogue with the US on National Missile Defense (NMD) issue, if the later makes an official offer, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhu Bangzao said on Tuesday.

Zhu told a press conference that so far, a US official bid is not coming to Beijing, which retains a clear-cut anti-NMD stance.

Speaking at the renewed routine news briefing coming after a two-month summer recess, Zhu reiterated that China will not join any arms race, but it is fully against US' move to seek strategic supremacy through NMD.

By quoting President Jiang Zemin's words on anti-missile issue in an August interview with the New York Times, Zhu affirmed that China stands for working out solutions through dialogues that would not harm security interests of any side on related affairs.

China's very limited nuclear weapons are solely for self-defense and pose no threat to any country, Zhu said.

(a href=http://english.peopledaily.com.cn/home.html> People’s Daily 09/04/2001)