After the U.S. imposed restrictions on the activities of senior Chinese diplomats in the U.S. in early September, the Chinese Foreign Ministry announced that it had issued a diplomatic note imposing “reciprocal restrictions” on U.S. embassies and consulates in China, including the Consulate General in Hong Kong. Authorities in Washington said on Sunday that Beijing’s move had escalated the situation.
A U.S. State Department spokesman said in a statement Sunday that Beijing’s restrictions on U.S. Consulate General personnel in Hong Kong and its requirement that U.S. citizens working for international organizations in China be notified in advance of meetings with Chinese nationals had clearly “escalated tensions.
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian said on November 11 that China had recently issued a diplomatic note imposing “reciprocal restrictions” on the activities of the U.S. Consulates in China, including the U.S. Consulate General in Hong Kong, and their personnel, and that the measures involved senior diplomats and all other personnel of the U.S. Consulates in China, including the U.S. Consulate General in Hong Kong. However, China did not specify the specific measures, but declared that it was “a legitimate and necessary response.
However, Washington on Sunday accused China of going too far. The U.S. said the advance notice requirement would henceforth include U.S. citizens not affiliated with the U.S. government, which it has never done for citizens of the People’s Republic of China. A U.S. State Department spokesman described Beijing’s intention to “escalate” the situation by targeting not only representatives of the U.S. Consulate General in Hong Kong with the so-called “reciprocity restriction,” but also with the “new requirement of advance notice of meetings. “The U.S. government decided in early September to restrict meetings between Chinese citizens and U.S. citizens.
In early September, the U.S. government decided to counter years of Chinese efforts to place major obstacles in the way of U.S. diplomats in Beijing by requiring senior Chinese diplomats in the U.S. to obtain permission from the U.S. before entering U.S. campuses or meeting with local government officials in the future.
In the op-ed article, titled “Resetting Relations Based on Reciprocity,” Ambassador Branstad points out that the U.S.-China relationship has become increasingly unbalanced, with U.S. companies, journalists, diplomats and even civil society in China denied equal access. The U.S. welcomes free access to the U.S. market for Chinese companies to sell investment bids, Chinese students and researchers to universities and laboratories, Chinese government journalists to report from the U.S. without restrictions for a long time, and Chinese diplomats to have unrestricted access to U.S. society, but U.S. journalists face restrictions in reporting on, and even entering, China, and U.S. diplomats need to have the most basic interaction with the Chinese people. Approval.
This article was declined for publication by the official media, People’s Daily.
In July, Washington ordered the closure of the Chinese Consulate General in Houston, and Beijing later retaliated by closing the US Consulate General in Chengdu. The U.S.-China diplomatic standoff comes against a backdrop of severely damaged U.S.-China relations, from trade wars to high technology, from human rights to Hong Kong, from the detention of Uighurs in Xinjiang to the Xinguan epidemic.
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