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18-05-2026
NEW YORK: China’s UN ambassador on Friday criticized a proposed US-Bahraini resolution on the Strait of Hormuz, saying the content and timing were not right and passing it would not be helpful.
The draft resolution demands Iran halt attacks and mining in the strait but diplomats have said it is likely to meet with Russian and Chinese vetoes if it comes to a vote. Both countries vetoed a similar US-backed resolution last month, arguing it was biased against Iran.
The Pass Blue news portal, which focuses on UN news, posted a short clip of an impromptu interview with China’s UN envoy Fu Cong in which he said, when asked about the resolution: “We don’t think the content is right, and the timing is not right.
“What we need is to urge both sides to engage in serious and good-faith negotiations that can resolve the issue. So passing a resolution at this stage, we don’t think is going to be helpful,” he said.
Fu said that if it were up to China as the current president of the 15-member UN Security Council, the resolution would not be put up for a vote.
China’s UN mission said it was China’s responsibility as council president to arrange a vote if the resolution drafters requested this but so far there had been no request.
The US mission to the United Nations did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Fu’s remarks came after US President Donald Trump held a two-day summit with Chinese leader Xi Jinping that ended on Friday, during which, according to the White House, they agreed that the strait must remain open and Xi made clear China’s opposition to the militarization of the waterway and any effort to charge a toll for its use.
Xi did not comment on the issue, although China’s foreign ministry aired Beijing’s frustration with the Iran war, saying: “This conflict, which should never have happened, has no reason to continue.”
Last week, the US on Thursday urged countries to support its United Nations resolution demanding Iran halt attacks and mining of the Strait of Hormuz but diplomats said China and Russia are likely to veto it.
A Chinese veto would be awkward ahead of US President Donald Trump’s trip to China next week, where the Iran war is like to be high on the agenda.
A previous resolution backed by the United States that appeared to open a path to legitimizing US military action against Iran failed last month after Russia and China exercised their vetoes in the 15-member UN Security Council.
Standing alongside envoys of Gulf countries that support the new draft, Washington’s UN envoy Mike Waltz told reporters that any countries that “seek to throw it out, are setting a very, very dangerous precedent.”
“We have to ask ourselves, if a country chooses to oppose such a simple proposition, do they really want peace?”
The new text was drafted by the US and Bahrain, with support from Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait and Qatar.
Iran’s UN Ambassador Amir Saeid Iravani called the resolution “deeply flawed, one-sided and politically motivated.”
“The United States has neither the legal, political, nor moral standing to portray itself as a defender of freedom of navigation or maritime security,” he said, referring to the US military’s blockade on Iranian ships.
US President Donald Trump left China on Friday with no major breakthroughs on trade or tangible help from Beijing to end the Iran war, despite two days spent heaping praise on his host, Xi Jinping. (Int’l News Desk)
