BEIJING, March 10 -- Senior Colonel Tan Kefei, spokesperson for the Chinese Ministry of National Defense (MND) slammed Australian Defense Ministry’s negative remarks over China on Thursday when answering reporter's questions.
Reporter: It is reported that recently Australian Defense Minister Peter Dutton claimed that Australia will do "whatever we can" to deter China from "acts of aggression", when asked about the prospect of arming Taiwan in a interview. Previously, as for the so-called incident of "laser irradiation" by Chinese warships, Mr Dutton said that Australia must expose China's bullying behavior. The Australian Defense Ministry has also issued several statements excusing for Australian military aircraft’s close-in reconnaissance on Chinese naval vessels. What's your comment?
Tan Kefei: We've noticed the relevant reports. Australian defense chief's remarks grossly interfered in China's internal affairs and wantonly distorted China's actions to safeguard national sovereignty and territorial integrity, which fully exposed his Cold War mentality and ideological bias and seriously damaged relations between the two countries and their militaries. China is strong discontent with and firmly opposed to it.
The Taiwan question is purely an internal affair of China which brooks no outside interference, and Australia has no business making irresponsible remarks. No one and no force can stop the historical trend that China will solve the Taiwan question and realize a complete national reunification. Anyone who makes troubles on the Taiwan question will suffer the worst consequences in the end. The Chinese people's Liberation Army is always in full readiness to thwart resolutely any interference from external forces and any "Taiwan independence" plot by separatist forces.
China has previously made detailed and conclusive clarification with regard to the encounter between Chinese naval vessels and Australian military aircraft. Here, I would like to reiterate that in the whole process of meeting with Australian military aircraft, the Chinese naval ships maintained safe, standardized and professional operation in line with relevant international law and international practice. It is evident in the video taken by the Chinese naval ship that the Australian military aircraft was conducting close-in reconnaissance on Chinese naval vessels. The Australian military aircraft’s conduct was malicious in intention and unprofessional in operation, and posed threats to the safety of ships, aircraft and personnel of both sides. Instead of reflecting on itself, the Australian side repeatedly spread disinformation, made false accusations against China and advocated confrontation constantly, which is actually the "troublemaker" to the regional peace and stability.
These days have seen some senior Australian military and political officials making negative remarks on China out of their political self-interests, preaching the so-called 'Chinese military expansion', hyping up confrontation with China in the South China Sea, and barnstorming alliance against China. We have noticed that there are many insightful people in Australia who criticized these erroneous remarks. We urge certain senior Australian military and political officials to stop exaggerating and hyping the 'China threat', instead, deal with Taiwan-related issues carefully, do more to enhance mutual trust between the two sides, and never be impenitently doing wrong things.
