FOUR ‘INTERFERING’ U.S. OFFICIALS FACE SANCTIONS

China on Monday announced sanctions on four American officials, including prominent Republican senators Marco Rubio and Ted Cruz, for “interfering in China’s internal affairs” with their condemnation of Beijing’s human rights abuses in China’s Xinjiang region.

There was no detail on what the sanctions would involve, but the move comes days after the Trump administration banned three Chinese officials from visiting the United States and froze any assets they might have there.

The measures expand the tit-fortat hostilities between Beijing and Washington.

“Xinjiang affairs are China’s internal affairs and the U.S. has no right to interfere in them,” Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying said in Beijing.

“We urge the United States to immediately withdraw its wrong decision,” she said.

The four Americans targeted Monday are Sam Brownback, the Trump administration’s ambassador for international religious freedom, and three members of the U.S. Congressional Executive Commission on China: Rep. Chris Smith, and Sens. Rubio and Cruz.

China had vowed to retaliate after the Trump administration blacklisted Chen Quanguo, the Communist Party secretary in the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region and a member of the Politburo; Zhu Hailun, party secretary of the Xinjiang political and legal committee; and Wang Mingshan, party secretary of the Xinjiang public security bureau.