Chinese Communist Party Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian speaks during a regular press conference in Beijing on April 8, 2020
On Friday (April 2), a video of a media reporter demanding an explanation from Zhao Lijian about Li Yang’s insult to Trudeau came to light on Twitter, sparking a wave of attention and hot debate among netizens.
The video shows an English-speaking journalist at the press conference, first repeating the full text of Li Yang’s insult to Trudeau on Twitter, and then asking two questions: First, is it now accepted practice in the Chinese Foreign Ministry to refer to leaders of other countries as “boy”? Secondly, there may be people in Canada who don’t understand the word “running dog,” “Can you explain what’s running? And what does dog mean?”
In the process of this reporter’s question, Zhao Lijian expression indifferent, head down casually fiddling with the information in his hands, from time to time raised his head blankly look at. When the reporter finished his question, Zhao was silent for a few seconds before responding, “You’re talking about his personal Twitter feed, we generally don’t comment on related content.”
On March 28, Li Yang uploaded a photo of Trudeau to his Twitter account while tweeting, “Boy, your greatest achievement is to screw up the friendly relations between the CCP and Canada and reduce Canada to a lapdog of the US. Loser!!!” As a high-ranking diplomat, Li Yang blatantly disregarded basic diplomatic etiquette by insulting the leader of another country, a move unanimously condemned by Western democracies.
Now, when Western media reporters asked Zhao Lijian to explain Li Yang’s insult to Trudeau, Zhao indifferently refused to comment, without any intention to reflect and admit his mistake, attracting many overseas Chinese netizens’ criticism again.
After the incident in which Li Yang insulted Trudeau, Wang Lu, president of the Canadian Association for the Promotion of Civic Power, had publicly called on Ottawa to take a stand in protest, saying bluntly, “Now this kind of war wolf, it really gives us shame, the world’s Chinese are embarrassed, it’s hard for us to live here Chinese ah!”
Wang Lu also mocked that Li Yang’s description of Canada and Trudeau shows the extent of the Chinese Communist Party’s “diplomatic etiquette lessons.
Lin Wen, co-founder of the Chinese Canadian Political Affairs Council (CCPAC), told Radio Free Asia that Chinese diplomats are now frequently putting on a war-wolf show, which is, frankly speaking, a show for their own political future. He analyzed, “It must be an instruction from Zhongnanhai, and it is possible that whoever scolds fiercely and performs well will be promoted and rewarded.”
Lin Wen believes that it should be that the Chinese Communist Party officials know that the Canadian government will not intervene in Meng’s case anyway, so they have to perform the war wolf through the Chinese Communist diplomats, “just to appease the emotions of some brain-damaged little pinkies at home.
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