国内英语新闻:1st LD-Writethru: China firm in safeguarding national sovereignty, security: FM spokesperson

BEIJING, March 26 (Xinhua) -- China is above-board and open, and has sufficient determination and ability to resolutely defend its national sovereignty and security, while safeguarding its interests and dignity, a Foreign Ministry spokesperson said on Friday.

Spokesperson Hua Chunying made the remarks at a press briefing at which a video was presented to reporters.

The video showed Lawrence Wilkerson, chief of staff to former U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell, speaking about the three-fold purpose of the U.S. military's presence in Afghanistan. One of the stated purposes, he said, is the containment of China.

"Well, the CIA would want to destabilize China, and that would be the best way to do it, to foment unrest and join with those Uygurs (in Xinjiang) in pushing the Han Chinese in Beijing from internal places rather than external," Wilkerson said.

Commenting on the video, Hua said, "As you have just seen, the former senior U.S. official who helped instigate the Iraq War admitted himself that the so-called Xinjiang issue was nothing but a U.S. strategic plot to destabilize and contain China from within."

She added that, in this "blockbuster" directed by the United States, some politicians from the United States and some of its allies, as well as some media outlets, have played an extremely disgraceful role.

Either they colluded with anti-China forces, creating groundless rumors and baseless slander, or they chose to believe the lies fabricated by a few anti-China forces, rather than listening to the common aspirations of more than 25 million people of all ethnic groups in Xinjiang and accepting the basic facts of Xinjiang's development and progress, Hua said.

Now, the United States and some of its Western allies began to make an issue of the cotton production in Xinjiang, falsely asserting the existence of sensational "crimes" there, such as "forced labor" and "forced sterilization," and even "genocide," while imposing sanctions on relevant Chinese institutions and individuals on this ground, the spokesperson added.

"We warn the U.S. side that today's China is neither Iraq nor Syria, nor the late Qing Dynasty under the cruel oppression of the Eight-Power Allied Forces. China is above-board and open. Facts and truth will lay bare all malicious lies and rumors against China," she said.