UNITED NATIONS, April 29 (Xinhua) -- A Chinese envoy on Monday called on the international community to stick to the line of pragmatic and effective nuclear disarmament.

The complete prohibition and thorough destruction of nuclear weapons is in the interest of all humanity, Fu Cong, head of the Department of Arms Control of the Chinese Foreign Ministry, told the third session of the Preparatory Committee for the 2020 Review Conference of the Parties to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons.

"We should follow the principles of maintaining global strategic stability and undiminished security for all, as well as the step-by-step approach," he added.

The countries possessing the largest nuclear arsenals should, in accordance with the consensus of the international community and provisions of the relevant UN documents including UN General Assembly resolutions, fulfill in earnest their special and primary responsibility for nuclear disarmament, keep and renew their bilateral nuclear disarmament treaties and take further steps to make drastic and substantive cuts of their nuclear weapons, said the envoy.

This will create necessary conditions for attaining the ultimate goal of complete and thorough nuclear disarmament, Fu said, adding that no nuclear disarmament initiative should run counter to these fundamental principles.

All nuclear-weapon states should invariably abandon the policy of first-use of nuclear weapons, undertake unconditionally not to use or threaten to use nuclear weapons against non-nuclear-weapon states and nuclear-weapon-free zones, and to negotiate and conclude an international legal instrument to this end, he said.