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China has appealed to countries to form their own security apparatus to counter the U.S. influence on world affairs.
Chinese President Xi Jinping turned to fellow BRICS members Brazil, Russia, India, and South Africa to “accommodate each other’s core interests and major concerns, respect each other sovereignty, security and development interests, oppose hegemonism and power politics, reject Cold War mentality and bloc confrontation and work together to build a global community of security for all,” according to the Financial Times.
The move comes months after the U.S.’s disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan and amid Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and blossoming tensions between the U.S. and China over Taiwan.
Tian Wenlin, a professor of international relations at Renmin University in Beijing, accused the Western-led world order of a “barbaric and bloody” stewardship of world affairs and told the paper that the U.S. continues to drag other countries into wars.
He said the world needs a new leader that will set up a global security framework “based on equality and mutual trust in the face of the rapid changes in the international landscape.”
“As a result, the Global Security Initiative was designed to protect the security interests of a broader spectrum of people around the world,” he said.
Xi’s proposal runs counter to last week’s “Quad” meeting in the region that included leaders from Australia, Japan, India, and the U.S.
Xi said the GSI initiative is meant to “uphold the principle of indivisible security, build a balanced, effective and sustainable security architecture, and oppose the building of national security on the basis of insecurity in other countries.”
TRENDPOST: Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi wrote in The People’s Daily that the initiative “contributes Chinese wisdom to make up for the human peace deficit and provides Chinese solution to cope with international security challenge.” He wrote that China will never claim hegemony, seek expansion or spheres of influence, nor engage in an arms race.”
The Trends Journal has reported that Beijing has refused to condemn the Russia Ukraine invasion and blames Western governments of contributing to the invasion. (See “CHINA CALLS FOR RESTRAINT IN UKRAINE, BLAMES WEST FOR CALAMITY,” “BEIJING: STOP WESTERN SANCTIONS ON RUSSIA” and “WILL CHINA SOON INVADE TAIWAN?”)
We reported back in February 2021 that Biden announced a task force at the Pentagon that will form a policy to counter China during his term in the White House after he called Beijing “our most serious competitor,” a report said.
Biden told workers at the Pentagon that the U.S. will “meet the China challenge” by taking a “whole-of-government effort, bipartisan cooperation in Congress, and strong alliances and partnerships.”
China has seen some recent diplomatic misses. Sweden recently announced that it will upgrade its office in Taipei, which was seen as an effort by Stockholm to show strong relations with Taiwan, and, as the Trends Journal reported, Olaf Sholz, the German chancellor, visited Japan instead of China during his first official trip to the region.
In Step
A State Department spokesperson told The Diplomat that China is maintaining the same line as Russia, “parrot[ing] some of what we have heard coming from the Kremlin,” including the concept of “indivisible security.”
An Asian diplomat said Beijing tends to “come out with an excessively large framework that nobody objects to. The idea is that even if countries don’t agree wholeheartedly, at least they can’t fully oppose it. Then, bit by bit, they use the framework to chip away at the US.”
Ned Price, the State Department spokesperson, responded to Xi’s comments and said the U.S. will continue to uphold the rules-based international system it had built with like-minded partners based on respect for human rights, sovereignty and self-determination, LawfareBlog.com reported.