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- THE WEEK, Page 23WORLDChina's Smoke Signal
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- An underground nuclear blast tells the world where to go
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- In what amounts to an obscene gesture to the rest of the
- world, China exploded a nuclear warhead with a yield of 1 million
- tons of tnt at its underground test range in far northwestern
- Xinjiang province. It was the largest such blast the Chinese
- have ever detonated and far bigger than the 150-kiloton testing
- limit the U.S. and the former Soviet Union have been observing
- under a 1974 agreement.
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- Chinese officials confirmed that the explosion was for
- military purposes, but then blandly added that Beijing's testing
- program has "exercised restraint" to conform with the
- government's "basic position for complete prohibition and
- thorough destruction of nuclear weapons."
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- Increasingly at odds with post-cold war norms, China also
- claims there is no truth in Western charges that it secretly
- sells nuclear and ballistic missile technology to Third World
- countries, colludes to evade customs duties or violates
- copyright agreements.
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