FM: China firmly opposed to U.S. moves that undermine ties

BEIJING, March 7 (Xinhua) -- Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi said Sunday China is firmly opposed to the recent moves of the United States that undermined China's core interests and the overall interests of bilateral ties.

Yang made the remarks at a press conference on the sidelines of the annual session of the National People's Congress (NPC), the country's top legislature.

He said that the China-U.S relationship had a good start after President Obama took office last year.

However, the U.S arms sales to Taiwan and U.S leaders' meeting with the Dalai Lama "caused a serious disturbance to the China-U.S ties and posed difficulty to the cooperation between the two countries," he said.

"Such a situation is not in the interest of either side, and the responsibility for the difficulty in Sino-U.S. relations does not lie with China," he said.

He said China's position had been announced a few days ago, when U.S. Deputy Secretary of State James Steinberg and National Security Council Senior Director for Asian Affairs Jeffrey Bader visited China.

"The Chinese side further stated in full its principled position on China-U.S. relations and on major issues, including Taiwan and Tibet related issues," Yang said.

"We pointed out that the relevant moves taken by the United States side had seriously violated the principles set out in the three China-U.S. joint communiques and the China-U.S. joint statement," he said.

"The moves undermined China's core interests and the overall interests of China-U.S. relations, and China is firmly opposed to these moves," he said.