China Denies Trump's Nuclear Testing Allegations: Reaffirming Commitment to Non-Proliferation

President Trump has claimed that several countries including Russia and China have been conducting underground nuclear tests without public knowledge.

Beijing has officially denied US President Donald Trump's allegations that China is among nations testing nuclear weapons. Trump previously asserted that China, Russia, North Korea, and Pakistan are secretly testing nuclear devices.

During a regular press conference in Beijing, spokeswoman Mao Ning stated, "As a responsible nuclear-weapons state, China has always adhered to the path of peaceful development, pursued a policy of no first use of nuclear weapons, upheld a self-defence nuclear strategy and abided by its commitment to suspend nuclear testing."

She further expressed that Beijing hopes Washington will "take concrete actions to safeguard the international nuclear disarmament and non-proliferation regime and maintain global strategic balance and stability."

In an interview with CBS's "60 Minutes" program, Trump claimed, "Russia's testing, and China's testing, but they don't talk about it." He added, "I don't want to be the only country that doesn't test," including North Korea and Pakistan in his list of nations allegedly conducting nuclear tests.

Confusion has emerged regarding Trump's directive for the United States to begin testing, particularly whether he intended to authorize the country's first nuclear explosion since 1992. The 79-year-old Republican initially announced this surprising decision via social media on Thursday, moments before meeting with Chinese leader Xi Jinping in South Korea.

This announcement followed Russia's statement that it had tested a new nuclear-powered cruise missile called Burevestnik and a nuclear-powered underwater drone capable of carrying nuclear weapons. When asked directly if he planned for the United States to detonate a nuclear weapon for the first time in over three decades, Trump confirmed, "I'm saying that we're going to test nuclear weapons like other countries do, yes."

It's worth noting that no country except North Korea is known to have conducted a nuclear detonation in decades. Russia and China haven't carried out such tests since 1990 and 1996, respectively.

When pressed further, Trump elaborated, "They don't go and tell you about it... As powerful as they are, this is a big world. You don't necessarily know where they're testing. They test way underground, where people don't exactly know what's happening with the test. You feel a little bit of a vibration."

Trump's energy secretary, Chris Wright, has attempted to clarify the situation, telling Fox News, "I think the tests we're talking about right now are system tests. These are not nuclear explosions." He explained further, "These are what we call 'non-critical explosions', so you're testing all the other parts of a nuclear weapon to make sure they deliver the appropriate geometry and they set up the nuclear explosion."

Since 1996, the United States has been a signatory to the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty, which prohibits all atomic test explosions, whether for military or civilian purposes.