On Tuesday, a top State Department official said that “in many ways, China has been supporting Russia’s war in Ukraine from the beginning,” even if it hasn’t provided lethal aid.
Additionally, the United States has already blacklisted a bevy of Chinese companies for supporting Russia, a top Commerce Department official also said.
Thirteen Chinese entities have also been added to the Entities List by the US Commerce Department for providing support to Russia, including one “that was supplying parts to the Iranian drone program,” Under Secretary of Commerce for Industry and Security at the Commerce Department Alan Estevez said a House Foreign Affairs Committee hearing.
“We will not hesitate to put companies on the Entity List as soon as we see factual data that they are supplying Russia. And we have, we’re looking at across all third parties, but especially China in that regard,” Estevez said.
Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs Daniel Kritenbrink noted that the US has “made very clear that we will not hesitate to take steps to hold to account PRC entities that assist Russia.”
“And we’ve made that very clear to the Chinese. The Secretary certainly did so in Munich, and of course, the President and the national security adviser have done so directly to the Chinese on previous occasions,” he said.
Secretary of State Antony Blinken has repeatedly accused Beijing of trying to have it “both ways” on the war.
“It’s, on the one hand, trying to present itself publicly as neutral and seeking peace, while at the same time it was talking up Russia’s false narrative about the war. It is, as I said, providing nonlethal assistance through its companies and now contemplating lethal assistance,” Blinken said in an interview with ABC last week.
Speaking at the House Foreign Affairs Committee hearing, Kritenbrink noted that Beijing has disseminated Russian propaganda and used its own disinformation “to support Russia’s war there and to blame, inappropriately, the war on the west, the United States, and NATO.”
“We’ve seen China’s stepping up its economic engagement and purchases from Russia,” Kritenbrink said.
