On June 11, Yang Jiechi, Director of the Office of the Foreign Affairs Commission of the Communist Party of China (CPC), suddenly had a phone call with U.S. Secretary of State Blinken. Are China-US relations about to take a turn for the worse? On the contrary, as the G7+US-Russia summit begins, the Chinese Communist Party is once again being put on fire and is really anxious this time.
Blinken spoke with Yang Jiechi during his trip
As previously announced by the U.S. Department of State, June 9-15 is Blinken’s European tour, with destinations including the United Kingdom, Brussels, Belgium, and Geneva, Switzerland. With the G7+ summit followed by summits with NATO and the EU, and finally the U.S.-Russia summit, Blinken should not be able to schedule a call with Yang Jiechi in advance during such a critical and busy trip. If he really needs to talk to Yang Jiechi, he can do so before his trip or after he returns to the United States.
After more than two months of little interaction between the diplomatic services of the two sides following the impasse in the U.S.-China diplomatic talks in Alaska, this call popped up during Blinken’s trip to Europe. The Western alliance was about to discuss the topic of confronting the Chinese Communist Party in depth, and the top echelon of the Chinese Communist Party obviously could not sit still, and immediately sent Yang Jiechi to hasten to talk to Blinken, without regard to the fact that Blinken was still on his journey, which was actually a breach of basic diplomatic etiquette.
Blinken accepted the call anyway, and a brief statement from the State Department said that Blinken spoke about denuclearizing the Korean Peninsula and addressing global challenges, including Iran, Burma and the climate crisis. Blinken also emphasized the investigation into the origin of the virus and asked for cooperation and transparency from the Chinese Communist Party. In addition, he talked about human rights in Xinjiang and the democratization of Hong Kong, and also called on Beijing to stop pressuring Taiwan and resolve cross-strait issues peacefully. Blinken concluded by presenting several cases of arbitrary detentions and exit bans of U.S. and Canadian citizens in China, calling for their immediate release.
Most of these are thorny topics between the U.S. and China, which the CCP certainly does not want to hear or talk about. The Chinese Communist Party’s statement basically avoids these headaches, except for repeating the clichés of “no conflict, no confrontation,” “one China,” “interference in internal affairs,” and denying that the epidemic is being concealed. What Yang Jiechi really wants to say is that the “basic norms of international relations” are not the “so-called rules made by a few countries” and not the “small-circle” multilateralism.
The Communist Party of China (CPC) is trying to prevent the United States from discussing the topic of targeting the CPC at the G7+ summit and the U.S.-European summit, and the signs are now quite clear that the Western countries are entering a more concrete stage of operation to unite against the CPC.
Western countries are scrambling to take a stand to scare the Chinese Communist Party top brass
The U.S. government has made clear its procedures for investigating the origins of the epidemic, and all sectors have spoken out to hold the Chinese Communist Party accountable. on June 10, U.S. President Joe Biden and British Prime Minister Johnson took the lead in talks and jointly declared their support for an independent investigation into the origins of the epidemic.
On the same day, Health Secretary Hancock also said that the Chinese Communist Party’s cover-up of the outbreak had led to an early failure to respond to the epidemic, resulting in heavy losses and the need for a “fully independent investigation” into the origin of the virus. He said he “does not support vaccine diplomacy, let alone coercion”.
On June 10, European Council President Michel said at a press conference that the EU was “very sure” that “we need full transparency in order to learn from the coronavirus (CCP virus, Wuhan virus) pandemic.” European Commission President von der Leyen added that understanding the specific origins of the CCP virus is “crucial” and that “investigators need to have full access to everything they need to really find the source of the pandemic.”
Whether it’s the G7+ summit or the subsequent U.S.-European summit, accountability for the CCP’s epidemic is bound to be one of the common topics, and the CCP clearly can’t hide from it.
On June 10, the British government also released its Biannual Report on Hong Kong, arguing that the Chinese Communist Party has made extensive arrests of political dissidents and unilaterally changed Hong Kong’s electoral system, clearly undermining the space for Hong Kong people to exercise their rights and freedoms. Earlier, the European Union also condemned the Chinese Communist Party for undermining Hong Kong’s electoral system.
On June 9, Japan and Australia held a “2+2” meeting between their foreign and defense ministers, in which both sides affirmed the importance of stability in the Taiwan Strait, and will strengthen cooperation on maritime security in response to the CCP’s frequent activities in the East and South China Seas.
It is not hard to imagine that economic and trade issues, human rights, Hong Kong and Taiwan, and Indo-Pacific security issues will undoubtedly be among the topics of the G7+ summit, and a strongly worded joint statement should come as no surprise. The CCP’s biggest worry should be that Western countries will work together to formulate specific measures against the CCP, and the joint anti-communist effort will enter a substantive operational stage, which will naturally alarm the top echelon of the CCP.
Yang Jiechi’s eagerness to speak with Blinken to try to stop such topics will not actually help. The CCP has pretended in recent days to start softening toward the U.S., though it is of little significance.
On June 9, Wang Yi spoke with South Korean Foreign Minister Chung Eui-yong on the phone, saying that the United States was “provoking a confrontation with the group” and asking South Korea to “persist in its confrontation with the group. “He asked South Korea to “stick to the correct position” and “not to be led off the rhythm”.
The Chinese Foreign Ministry has nothing better to do at the moment and is now focusing its main efforts on bringing ASEAN countries together again; however, it is Russia in the north that is another major preoccupation of the Chinese Communist Party.
China’s Communist Party Becomes One of the Key Chips in Russia-U.S. Relations
The last major event of Biden’s European trip is a meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin, and the Communist Party’s top brass should be anxious to see what will happen to the position of its repeatedly claimed ally.
Xi Jinping’s attempts to meet with Biden have not yet been scheduled; Xi should also be keen to meet with Putin, also without success. Now that the U.S. and Russian heads have taken the lead in meeting, the U.S. has clearly distinguished between China and Russia strategically, and Russia has taken heart, using the CCP as leverage in every way possible to try to improve relations with the U.S.
In a video media event on June 4, Putin responded to a question from Xinhua News Agency President He Ping and went on to say that “the development of Russian-Chinese relations has reached an unprecedented high level. While the Chinese Communist Party media was eager to get Putin to make a statement, Putin actually used the opportunity to use the Chinese Communist Party as a bargaining chip again ahead of the U.S.-Russia summit. Xinhua revealed that bilateral trade between Russia and China exceeds $100 billion and expects to surpass $200 billion by 2024, figures that are really unlike a partnership.
The U.S.-Russia talks are unlikely to be as close as they are, but they should not fall apart. Russia will certainly take the opportunity to improve Russian-U.S. relations, at least hinting that it will not engage in a U.S.-China confrontation, while hoping to get some promises of benefits. Russia actually wants the Chinese Communist Party to continue to provoke the United States, and may even be looking forward to a war between the United States and China in the Pacific, from which Russia may benefit even more.
On June 10, Xinhua News Agency published an opinion piece, “Biden’s Visit to Europe Can’t Avoid “Awkward Things” and “Troubles””. The article sings the praises of U.S.-European relations and deliberately says that the U.S. is trying to unite with its allies to “jointly suppress Russia and China,” but the Chinese Communist Party’s calculations seem to have failed, as the U.S. is repositioning the U.S.-China-Russia triangle, and the positions of China and Russia during the Cold War are now being swapped.
On June 9, Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin issued an internal directive to launch several major efforts across the Department of Defense to counter the biggest security challenges posed by the CCP. It continues to argue that the CCP “adheres to the path of peaceful development and pursues a defensive national defense policy,” falsely claims that it “does not target or threaten any country,” and scolds the U.S. for rendering “threats from other countries” and “a thief crying out for a thief.
The Chinese Communist Party’s top brass is really anxious, and they have used all the hard and soft tricks, but it is difficult to change the topic of the G7+US-EU+US-Russia summit. The Chinese Communist Party is once again riding a tiger, and I’m afraid that the internal rhetoric is no longer working, and the close cooperation of the Western anti-communist alliance will undoubtedly lead to a further escalation of the Communist Party’s infighting. 2021 is expected to be a very hot summer, will the Beidaihe meeting still be held?
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