MOSCOW, April 8. /TASS/. Imposition of sanctions does not help solve problems but only makes the situation around Ukraine worse, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi said Wednesday.
"China has stuck to an objective and unbiased position on the Ukrainian crisis from the start. From the beginning, we have insisted that settlement should necessarily be carried out exclusively by political means. The military variant is hopeless," Wang said in an interview with Russia's Rossiya 24 TV channel.
"Unilateral sanctions do not help solve the problem, they only aggravate the already complicated situation," he said.
According to the top Chinese diplomat, the Chinese side "supports the adoption and implementation of the new Minsk agreements and notes with satisfaction that the military aspect of the agreements is already being gradually implemented."
Wang urged Ukraine to build relations between its different regions and different ethnic groups in a balanced way. He also called on Kiev to build traditional relations with Russia and establish ties with the European Union in a balanced way.
"Such a process is ultimately in line with the general vector of the Minsk process and matches the aspirations and wishes of an overwhelming majority of the international community members," he said.
Sanctions
Russian officials and companies came under the first batch of Western sanctions, including visa bans and asset freezes, after Russia incorporated Crimea in mid-March 2014 after the February 2014 coup in Ukraine.
Despite Moscow’s repeated statements that the Crimean referendum on secession from Ukraine was in line with the international law and the UN Charter and in conformity with the precedent set by Kosovo’s secession from Serbia in 2008, the West and Kiev have refused to recognize the legality of Crimea’s reunification with Russia.
The West announced new, sectoral, restrictions against Russia in late July 2014, in particular, for what the West claimed was Moscow’s alleged involvement in protests in Ukraine’s southeast.
In response, Russia imposed on August 6, 2014 a one-year ban on imports of beef, pork, poultry, fish, cheeses, fruit, vegetables and dairy products from Australia, Canada, the European Union, the United States and Norway.
New large-scale punitive measures against Russia followed in September and December 2014.