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China warned not to retaliate

F-16 sale to Taiwan will promote peace: US
WASHINGTON. Sept 4: The United States on Thursday stepped into a murky legal quagmire to defend Its sale of 150 F-16 Jet fighters to Taiwan and warned China not to retaliate by shipping arms to the Middle East, reports Reuter.
The US administration defended President George Bush's decision to sell the planes to Taiwan on strategic grounds, saying It would promote peace and stability In East Asia.
Most commentators saw the decision, which ended a 10-year prohibition against Taiwan acquiring advanced US warplane*. as a straight vote-getting move by Bush, who Is trailing Democratic presidential hopeful Bill Clinton in the polls two months before the November 3 general election.
China reacted furiously and threatened to pull out of talks among the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council aimed al curbing international weapon* sales.
On the face of it. Bush's decision seemed to contradict a
1982 communique which he helped negotiate with Beijing when he was vice president under Ronald Reagan.
In that document, the United States stated "that its arms sales to Taiwan will not exceed either In qualitative or quantitative terms the level of those supplied In recent years, since the establishment of diplomatic relations between the United States and China, and that It Intends to gradually reduce Ils sale of arms to Taiwan."
But US state department spokesman Joe Snyder insisted there was no contradiction between the communique and the sale of F- 16s because Taiwan's ageing force of antiquated1 F-5s and F-104s were going out of service and needed to be replaced.
"We said we would be providing spare parts. It's impossible now to provide the spare parts for the old aircraft that they have and we're maintaining the quality of that air force tn the only way that we have available." said Snyder.
Snyder said Beijings recent acquisition of Russian SU-27
aircraft was a factor in the decision which would give Taiwan the confidence necessary to continue to improve relations with Beijing
One of Washington's key concerns Is that China, which agreed under heavy US pressure last year not to sell ballistic missiles and other advanced weapons to Arab states, might go back on Its pledge as a way of demonstrating its anger over the Taiwan deal.
Snyder said the United States expected China to stand by its promise to abide by the provisions of the missile technology control regime and continue to take part in arms control talks.
"Clearly the Middle East is an area where al) arms transfers have to be examined carefully. We would expect China to continue to participate in the president's arms transfer restraint Initiative." he said.
Synder said Washington had offered to send assistant secretary of state William Clark to Beijing to explain the sale but arrangements for the visit had not yet been made.