INSIDE CHINA TODAY
(http://www.insidechina.com/news.php3?id=112503)

China's top disarmament official said on Wednesday U.S. plans to build an anti-missile defense system could trigger an arms race and threaten global and regional stability.

Sha Zukang, director of the Chinese Foreign Ministry's Department of Arms Control and Disarmament, said U.S. efforts to develop anti-missile missiles, known as the National Missile Defense (NMD) system, would have a formidable, adverse impact and tip the global balance.

"If such a balance and stability were shattered, the nuclear disarmament process would come to a grind or even be reversed," Sha wrote in the official China Daily.

"It will only poison the atmosphere, undermine the conditions necessary for nuclear disarmament and breed a potential danger of an arms race," Sha said.

He added: "Who can guarantee that other non-nuclear states will not go nuclear?"

Beijing had no immediate comment on a U.S. report that China appeared to be constructing a missile-related facility at a base about 300 miles (480 km) from Nationalist-ruled Taiwan.

The Washington Times said on Tuesday construction at the People's Liberation Army missile base was photographed by U.S. spy satellites in mid-October. A U.S. official later confirmed that there appeared to missile-related construction at the site.

The United States closely monitors China's military buildup because of the potential threat to Taiwan and the region. China has threatened to invade if Taiwan declares independence.

NEW BERLIN WALL

The China Daily published a cartoon of an American building a NMD wall with missiles and barbed wire. Two men watch on the other side of the wall, with one saying: "It seems he wants to build a new Berlin Wall."

Sha urged United States to "embrace" the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty signed with the then-Soviet Union.

The treaty limits defense systems designed to shoot down enemy missiles, on the theory that such shields would only tempt the other side to build more missiles to overwhelm the defenses.

Washington wants to amend the treaty to permit it to build a limited defense against any attack on the United States or U.S. troops stationed abroad by what it regards as "rogue states", such as North Korea and Iran, with a growing capacity to launch weapons of mass destruction.

Russia, which has rejected U.S. offers to amend the ABM treaty, flexed its military muscles this month. It test fired one of its short-range anti-missile rockets and for the first time in six years and an old nuclear-capable tactical missile.

WORRY DEFENSE UMBRELLA WOULD COVER TAIWAN

China is worried the anti-missile defense umbrella would cover Taiwan, a fledgling democracy with many friends in the U.S. Congress.

Taiwan has already bought technology for an air defense system with limited anti-aircraft and anti-missile capabilities, U.S. State Department spokesman James Rubin said.

The United States has also sold surface-to-air missiles as well as vehicle-mounted "stinger avenger" systems to Taiwan.

Rubin said no decisions on theater missile defense systems had been made, but added: "We do not preclude the possible sale of such systems to Taiwan in the future."

China has taken a more belligerent attitude toward the island since Taiwan President Lee Teng-hui called for bilateral ties to be conducted on a "special state-to-state" basis in July.

Sha said the United States has "far too frequently, used or threatened to use force in international affairs in a bid to seek its own absolute security and military superiority".

"We hold the view that countries that are the loudest advocates for missile non-proliferation are exactly the ones that have actually aggravated missile proliferation," Sha said.

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