LONDON (Reuters) – China’s ambassador to London said on Thursday that the United States was trying to trigger a new Cold War with the Communist state because it was searching for a scapegoat ahead of the U.S. presidential election in November.
“It is not China (that has) become assertive. It’s the other side of the Pacific Ocean who want to start new Cold War on China, so we have to make response to that,” China’s ambassador to London Liu Xiaoming told reporters. “We have no interest in any Cold War, we have no interest in any war.”
“We have all seen what is happening in the United States, they tried to scapegoat China, they want to blame China for their problems,” he said. “We all know this is an election year.”
“They want to do anything including treating China as an enemy,” Liu said. “Probably they think they need an enemy, they think they want a Cold War but we have no interest, we keep telling America, China is not your enemy, China is your friend, your partner.”
(Reporting by Guy Faulconbridge and Kate Holton, editing by Estelle Shirbon)
