China won't join arms control talks with Russia, US

China said Wednesday it will t join trilateral arms control talks with Russia and United States, calling m a "hoax" while pointing to American missile deployments "on China's doorstep."

"For us, this trilateral negotiation is thing but a hoax, to use word of U.S. president. It's thing more than a hoax and a game that China refuses to play," said Fu Cong, director general of China's arms control department at a press briefing in Beijing.

Fu said that American missiles in western Pacific and Washington's withdrawal in August 2019 from Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty between Russia and U.S., signed by Ronald Reagan and Mikhail Gorbachev, "pose a strategic threat to Chinese security."

China has nuclear weapons, ballistic missile capabilities and kw-how to make chemical and biological weapons — and it is updating its nuclear arsenal. Beijing also has signed various international weapons agreements, but ne limiting nuclear weapons.

U.S. and Russia have agreed to start arms control talks as only remaining treaty between two largest nuclear powers is poised to expire in less than a year.

Russia has offered to extend New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty, which expires in February, but Trump wants to see a three-way nuclear arms treaty that includes China.

Beijing, which is expanding its nuclear arsenal but is t nearly as big as ones held by U.S. and Russia, has expressed little to interest in negotiating or signing a pact.