The Western claims of Beijing setting up a "Chinese debt trap" in Africa are baseless and irresponsible, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Wang Wenbin said on Thursday.

Wang provided a list of data to show the win-win nature of Sino-African cooperation while criticizing Western officials and media over their attempts at driving a wedge between China and developing nations by using false claims.

Asked about claims of a "Chinese debt trap" raised and pushed by US Secretary of State Antony Blinken during a trip to Africa, Wang said at a regular press conference on Thursday that such claims were only used by US and other Western officials to shift responsibility.

According to data from the World Bank, at the end of 2020, bilateral creditors held 26% of the foreign loans of 82 low and medium-income countries, while commercial creditors and multilateral creditors made up 40% and 34%, respectively. China held less than 10% of the total external debts.

In the newly-added $475.2 billion of external debt in low and medium-income countries between 2015 and 2020, commercial debt from the global financial market accounted for 39%, Wang highlighted, quoting a European Network on Debt and Development survey that showed that 95% of sovereign debt in 31 indebted countries was held by Western financial firms.

For the upcoming better half of a decade, $940 billion need to be paid by low and medium-income countries, a World Bank estimate said. Among this total, 67% will go to Western...

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