, LUXEMBOURG: Foreign Secretary Jack Straw says Britain is not opposed to lifting a European Union arms embargo on China which France is pressing energetically to remove.
EU foreign ministers were to discuss the ban, imposed after the communist state crushed the Tiananmen Square democracy movement in 1989, at a meeting in Luxembourg on Monday but were not likely to reach a decision, diplomats said.
“To judge by what I hear from my colleagues, we are still a good way away from a consensus here,” German Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer told reporters on arrival.
Some EU diplomats, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Britain was among the countries resisting the removal of the embargo, partly in response to strong public pressure from the United States, its close ally.
But Foreign Secretary Straw said: “We wish to see the arms embargo reviewed. We are not in any sense quote 'against' the lifting of the embargo. But it has got to be done in a proper and sensible way and that is the process which has been agreed by the whole of the European Union.”
French President Jacques Chirac, who is visiting China to boost economic and political ties, denounced the embargo on Saturday in Beijing as a “circumstantial measure which is purely and simply hostile to China” and has no justification.
“That is why France, like most EU countries, is in favour of lifting this embargo,” Chirac said.
Other EU countries reported to have reservations about removing the ban are Sweden, Denmark and the Netherlands, mainly on human rights grounds.
The EU is reviewing its policy on the basis of three criteria — China's human rights record, tension with Taiwan and other measures to restrict arms exports, notably an EU code of conduct.
“Don't expect a decision today. There may be no decision until next year,” an EU official said.
However, some diplomats said they hoped to get the embargo lifted before an EU-China summit on December 8.
