China expressed concern on Monday about rules recently proposed by the United States that would subject a wider range of high-tech exports to China to a licensing process.  

U.S. companies exporting items on the list would need to show that they know their customers well enough to be certain that their products would not be used in weapons. Otherwise, they would have to obtain an export license.

"We are highly concerned about the United States expanding the products restricted for export to China, are studying the issue, and will comment on it after hearing the views of domestic industry," Chong Quan, spokesman for China's Commerce Ministry, said in a statement.

The restrictions served as unreasonable barriers to Sino-U.S. trade and were not in the interests of either country's industry or the healthy development of bilateral trade ties, Chong said on the ministry's Web site (www.mofcom.gov.cn).

"We hope the United States will abandon its 'Cold War' mentality and, with a broad view of bilateral relations, employ constructive measures to promote the development of high-tech trade as a way of easing the imbalances in two-way trade," he said.