The USA wants to initiate further sanctions against China because of the oppression of the Muslim Uighur minority. The US House of Representatives passed a law banning imports from China's Xinjiang region for forced labor. The House of Representatives approved the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act with an overwhelming 428-1 vote.
For the law to go into effect it has yet to pass the Senate and be signed by President Joe Biden. Republicans are accusing Democrats of delaying the law because it would complicate President Joe Biden's renewable energy agenda. The White House and the Democrats in Congress deny this. Xinjiang supplies most of the world's solar cell materials.
For years, human rights groups accuse China, the suppression
of the Uyghur in Xinjiang region before. The Beijing government has denied
allegations that China has set up an extensive network of prison camps for
Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities for forced labor. With reference to China's
human rights violations, the US announced on Monday that it would not send
government representatives to the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing.
USA Impose New Sanctions On Iran
With such an internal situation, it is worth wondering if
the US can face what Biden has described as "the challenge of our
time": the decline of democracy worldwide. For two decades, the values
of liberal democracy have been in retreat inside and outside the United
States. And this virtual meeting, due to Covid-19, attended by more than 100
heads of State and Government from around the world, and several hundred
personalities from civil society, will try to lay the foundations to reverse
the trend. It is an unprecedented initiative, that was born with the vocation
to continue each year. In fact, next year there will be a new 'summit', in
which a series of working documents created by the countries attending this
meeting will be analyzed. The big question is what will be the path of all this
in practice.
Among the countries that have not been invited, the two biggest competitors of the United States in the world, China and Russia, stand out. But also a number of Washington allies , such as Hungary, Singapore, Singapore, and Saudi Arabia. In exchange, governments such as Angola - which has been governed by the same party since it achieved independence from Portugal, 46 years ago - and the Democratic Republic of the Congo come.
Thus, realism collides with democracy. In all political freedom rankings in the world, Hungary is ahead of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and conversely, one wonders how the US is going to contain Iran without the support of Saudi Arabia, or China without that of Singapore. Even though these countries are not democracies.
China Responds To Accusations Against Wuhan: "The Virus Came From A Laboratory ... From The US"
That is historically the great paradox of American foreign
policy: how to defend democracy in a world in which many allied countries are
not democratic. And Biden hasn't broken up with her. The axis of its foreign action
is to stop the expansion of China. Which raises, again, the same problem:
democracy or realism? Because China never asks questions about human rights in
the countries in which it invests.
So the political and strategic reality is very different from the ideological principles. Washington may say that it promotes democracy, but in practice, authoritarian models are spreading. And that touches in a special way its rivalry with China. "When it comes to containing Chinese penetration in Latin America, the United States does not exist," the former vice president of Colombia and former ambassador of that country in Washington Francisco Santos, who today explained in the podcast, when he had already left politics, the Chinese authorities tried to get him to intercede with the Government of Juan Manuel Santos for the latter to hand-deliver a contract to a Chinese company.
Soon after, Santos' son, who is a congressman, had to cancel a trip to Taiwan - which is at the 'summit for democracy', which has not been to Beijing's liking either - due to pressure from China. All those are the policies that, in theory, go against the values of the 'top'. But, at the same time, they are part of a strategy that that country, which is the largest dictatorship in the world, first began in practice during the presidency of George W. Bush, two decades ago, and against which the United States has done a great deal. Little to date.
SHOW THAT "DEMOCRACY STILL WORKS"
The summit lasts two days, during which the Heads of State
and Government, representing more than half of the world's countries, will hold
a series of closed-door meetings on a series of topics, among which the
recovery stands out. democracy and institutions after Covid-19, the fight against
corruption, the defense of human rights -including, notably, freedom of
expression-, and digitization and its impact on democratic societies will be
the main themes of the summit, although, in the end, the key is summarized in
what Biden said in his only speech before the US Congress, on April 28:
"We have to show that democracy still works, that our government it works
and that we can meet the needs of citizens."
China's Dominance In International Institutions Should Be Examined, US Think Tank
It is, thus, an initiative very much in line with others launched by Biden, such as the alliance with Australia and Great Britain baptized as Aukus, the revitalization of the Quad, of which India, Japan, and Australia are also part, the Council of Commerce and Technology created at the 'summit' with the EU in Pittsburgh in September, or the cybersecurity 'summit' in October. The problem is that the Aukus, the Quad, and the Council of Commerce and Technology have very clear objectives. But the 'summit' for democracy, no.
That has led some skeptics to question its existence. As Stephen Walt, professor at Harvard and, in general, supporter of 'realism' has written in Foreign Policy, a theory that maintains that, in the world arena, countries should maximize their strategic advantages moved only by the reason of state, the The summit "illustrates two recurring problems in US foreign policy: the inability to set clear priorities, and the tendency to proclaim lofty goals that it is later unable to achieve."
Do You Know What I Have Posted on
Twitter Facebook Instagram Reddit tumblr
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment