Category: New Cold War

The West covered sports in 2008, but politics in 2022 – what changed?

The following article, originally carried in Global Times, by Brian Becker, Executive Director of the US campaigning organisation ANSWER (Act Now to Stop War and End Racism), contrasts US media coverage of the opening of the 2008 Beijing Olympics with that of the current Winter Olympics being held in the same city and in this way outlines the poisonous and corrosive effect of New Cold War propaganda.

Contrasting the US and Western media coverage of the first day of the summer Olympics in Beijing in 2008 with their coverage of the start of the Beijing Winter Olympics in early February speaks volumes about the new political consensus that Washington is attempting to impose on news organizations.

In 2008, France 24, the French news service, reported that “The British press was united in declaring the ceremony the best in Olympic history and a stunning display of China’s new-found confidence.”

The New York Times was almost gushing: The Times wrote at 8:20 am on August 8, 2008, “NBC is not providing television coverage of the spectacular opening ceremony from the Bird’s Nest stadium in Beijing – in fact, you won’t be able to see it anywhere in the U.S. until tonight. But you can follow all that happens here on the Times Olympic blog, LIVE, as it happens.”

Continue reading The West covered sports in 2008, but politics in 2022 – what changed?

Beijing 2022 and China’s challenge to sports imperialism

We are pleased to republish the full text of this insightful and thought-provoking article by Charles Xu of the Qiao Collective, originally published a few days before the opening of the Beijing Winter Olympics. In his article, Charles notes how New Cold War propaganda regarding Xinjiang, the case of tennis star Peng Shuai and China’s zero-Covid policies, have been deployed in the run up to the Games. He further links this to the long and deep-seated strain of racism, and specifically aristocratic white supremacy, in the modern Olympic movement and also outlines the history of China’s relationship to the Olympics from the days of Kuomintang rule through to Beijing becoming the first city ever to host both the summer and winter Games. HIs concluding section on the Games of the New Emerging Forces (GANEFO), organised in 1963 on the initiative of Indonesian President Sukarno, and in which the PRC played a crucial role, is particularly interesting. This was a time when an anti-imperialist Asian axis of Jakarta-Phnom Penh-Hanoi-Beijing-Pyongyang was often invoked. Some readers may note that the concept of New Emerging Forces continued to be frequently invoked by Korean President Kim Il Sung in his diplomatic and internationalist work over subsequent decades.

The incredible disappearing diplomatic boycott

On February 4, the 2022 Winter Olympics are set to open in Beijing. With this, the Chinese capital will become the first city to have hosted both the Summer and Winter Games. It will also make the People’s Republic of China the first country in the Global South ever to host the Winter Olympics, which have historically been dominated by Europe and North America (home to the top 14 countries in the all-time medal table). China remains the only Asian host nation in history besides Japan and South Korea, both of which are advanced capitalist states embedded firmly within the US economic and military sphere of influence.

These milestones have gone almost entirely unremarked-upon in Western media coverage leading up to the Games, which instead paints China as a uniquely “authoritarian” and therefore undeserving host. On this as with virtually every issue of geopolitical import, corporate media march in lockstep with their respective governments in their drive toward a new Cold War against China. The United States led the way in announcing a “diplomatic boycott” of the Beijing Olympics on December 6, 2021, citing allegations of “genocide and crimes against humanity in Xinjiang and other human rights abuses.” It was followed by Britain, Canada, and Australia (i.e. all but one of its “Five Eyes” allies), as well as Japan and a smattering of small north European countries. 

Continue reading Beijing 2022 and China’s challenge to sports imperialism

Eileen Gu doesn’t care what you think – and no one else should, either

We are pleased to republish this article by Ian Goodrum, originally published in China Daily on 9 February 2022, comprehensively exposing the stark hypocrisy of those criticising Eileen Gu (Gu Ailing) for choosing to compete for China in the Beijing Winter Olympics.

Since she was 15, Eileen Gu (Gu Ailing) has had a target on her back.

The US-born freestyle skier of Chinese heritage announced in 2019 she would be competing for the People’s Republic at the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics, a decision met with enthusiasm in China — for obvious reasons — but intense animosity on the other side of the Pacific. On social media, vile comments flooded in calling her every name under the sun. Gu was ungrateful, they said, and had spurned the country they felt was entitled to her labor.

That already venomous response shifted into overdrive this week, when Gu, now 18, won gold in women’s freeski big air. Her miraculous run included a career-first 1620 in competition, barely edging out her nearest opponent and sending her name into the stratosphere.

Continue reading Eileen Gu doesn’t care what you think – and no one else should, either

Eileen Gu controversy exposes the importance of racial loyalty to the American empire

This article by Friends of Socialist China co-editor Danny Haiphong, originally published on The Chronicles of Haiphong, unpacks the hysteria surrounding the decision of the young Chinese-American ski champion Eileen Gu (Gu Ailing) to represent China rather than the US at the Winter Olympics. Danny explains how the intense hostility Gu’s decision has generated in the US has its origins in the New Cold War, American exceptionalism, imperialism, and white supremacy.

Eileen Gu is a world class skier who has already won her first gold medal in the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics at the age of 18. Gu was raised in San Francisco by a mixed-race family. Her mom, who she posts about often on social media, is Chinese. In 2019, Gu announced that she planned to represent the Chinese national team for the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympic Games. But it is only within the last few weeks as the Winter Olympics prepared to launch that her decision began to stir a considerable amount of controversy. Gu has been labeled an ungrateful “traitor” to the United States for supposedly spurning the opportunities offered to her in the “land of the free.”

The vitriol directed at Gu has come from all corners of U.S. society. Former Olympic skier Jen Hudak told the media that Gu “became the athlete she is because she grew up in the United States, where she had access to premier training grounds and coaching that, as a female, she might not have had in China.” Popular right-wing talk show host Tucker Carlson claimed that Gu “renounced” her citizenship and betrayed her own country by choosing to ski for China.

A report in The Economist framed Gu’s decision as an agonizing moment for the teenage phenom who finds herself split between two countries engaged in a “superpower rivalry.” No evidence for this claim was provided in the article. Corporate media commentary has repeatedly emphasized that Gu was “born in the USA” while social media users on the far right have openly called for the Olympic skier to leave the country for her act of betrayal.

The intense reaction to Gu comes amid a tireless U.S. effort to delegitimize China in the lead up to the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics. U.S. President Joe Biden announced a “diplomatic boycott” of the Games last December, a relatively meaningless gesture that saw more than dozen State Department officials apply for visas to travel to the Games shortly after the policy went into effect. A non-stop propaganda blitz helped pass the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act a few weeks later. The bill effectively sanctions U.S. corporations from doing business in China’s Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region by requiring proof that products imported from the region are not made from “forced labor.” These policy moves just skim the surface of the U.S.-led New Cold War on China and its many forms of aggression in the military, diplomatic, economic, and information realms.

As I penned in a previous column, fear is a critical component of the U.S.’s racist and imperialist attacks on China. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi summed up modern American fear of China when she warned U.S. athletes on the day of the opening ceremony not to speak out against China for fear that its “ruthless” government would seek reprisal. Pelosi’s characterization of China fits one side of casual racism’s double-edged sword. Fear of China’s supposedly unmatched ruthlessness is complimented by a ceaseless suspicion of China’s COVID-19 response, poverty alleviation program, and overall political and economic stability. China is all-powerful yet never successful; a menace to the “free world” but on a never-ending road to collapse.

The U.S.-led New Cold War is an imperialist project. At its core is a ceaseless effort to undermine and eventually overthrow China’s socialist economic and political system. More visible to the naked eye is the palpable fear expressed by Western capitalists of China’s economy surpassing the U.S. in GDP terms over the next half decade. War profiteers have benefitted immensely from the New Cold War. The U.S. military budget continues to grow, with special funds set aside for countering the so-called “China threat.”

Of course, the New Cold War is also a reflection of a long history of imperialist aggression toward China dating back to the Opium Wars of the mid-19th century. The Opium Wars carved up China and left the nation impoverished and weak. Western imperialists justified plunging China into a “century of humiliation” with Yellow Peril racism. The Chinese were routinely dehumanized and portrayed in Western media as sneaky thieves and rapists who deserved to be deported or worse. Yellow Peril justified the passage of racist immigration laws which increased the rate of exploitation and violently managed the flow of surplus labor migrating from China.

China and Chinese people were only useful to the West so long as they were weak and subservient. This all changed after the Chinese revolution of 1949 sent shockwaves throughout the Western capitalist world. U.S. officials lamented over “losing China” to communism. China was placed under sanctions from 1949-1971 by the United States and threatened with nuclear war more than once.

However, Cold War imperialist aggression was unsuccessful in destabilizing China. To paraphrase Mao Zedong, the Chinese people stood up in 1949 and are showing no signs of sitting back down to their former oppressors. China’s achievements in poverty alleviation, public health, renewable energy, high-technology, and a myriad of other fields have changed the course of history. A multipolar world is emerging where non-white, formerly colonized nations assert their self-determination in the midst of a declining imperialist order. China is leading the way.

Racial loyalty is an expression of both conscious and unconscious resentment toward these developments and plays a central role in the anger over Gu’s decision to represent China. To many in the United States, Gu has chosen the side of the “savages” and the “wretched of the earth.” She has rejected the United States as her white motherland. The overriding perception is that the U.S.’s superiority is as inherent as China’s supposed inferiority, making Gu’s decision a clear pledge of loyalty to a country inhabited by 1.4 billion non-white people and 90-plus million members of the Communist Party of China. In the eyes of her detractors, Eileen Gu is not just an ungrateful immigrant but an assault on American exceptionalism itself.

Such a view is entirely irrational once the blinders of racism are taken off. Gu is deeply connected to China on a personal and professional level. She is fluent in Mandarin and spends most summers in Beijing visiting loved ones. Gu is a Chinese citizen and has several Chinese sponsors. Her mother works for an investment firm in China.

In addition to her connections to China, it is obvious that Gu is developing her moral compass and views her actions as bigger than herself. She has been an outspoken advocate on issues of anti-Asian racism and gender equality. In her Instagram post announcing the decision to ski for China, Gu informed her audience that she hopes to “unite people, promote common understanding, create communication, and forge friendship between nations.”

This is a powerful message that demonstrates Gu is less interested in geopolitics as she is about using her platform to promote peace and mutual understanding.

Of course, racism is never about the facts. Racism makes people see things that are not there and create problems that do not exist. The reaction to Gu is a manifestation of the ongoing importance of racial loyalty to the American Empire. Americanism has always been synonymous with white imperialist power, both in identity terms and through politics. Those who are perceived to cross the boundaries of political whiteness are traitors to the empire’s civilizing mission to dominate, exploit, and plunder in the name of “freedom” and have crossed the line into enemy territory.

I personally identify with the attacks on Eileen Gu. Growing up as a Vietnamese-American of mixed race, I constantly felt that my racial loyalty to the empire was being tested by peers and institutions. Most people saw me as nothing but a “gook” or a “chink,” a target of imperialist wars of prior generations. The message from American society was clear as a young person: I could either put my head down and embrace the white American side of my family or face the threat of violence from white peers who took issue when I would speak up to their racist demagogy. When I would embrace my status as a subordinate and link with those of oppressed racial and national backgrounds, teachers would ask me why I chose to spend time with “knuckleheads” at the expense of my “potential.”

The U.S. is a racist society. No matter how “mixed-race” the U.S. becomes, white supremacy demands that the masses make political decisions based upon their loyalty to the American imperialist project. Racial loyalty subsumes class contradictions in a sea of confusion and directs political energy toward the destruction of an enemy “other.” Majorities of Americans Westerners have been convinced that China and its people are their enemies.

Eileen Gu has exposed how racial loyalty to the United States remains a prominent feature of a declining empire. Her positive message of peace and cooperation is viewed by many as an act of betrayal to her American citizenship—a euphemism for whiteness. White supremacy is inextricably bound with the Cold War 2.0. being led by the United States and its junior partners. Gu’s desire for common understanding among nations is unattainable unless white supremacy is confronted and thrown into the dustbin of history along with the system of imperialism that gave it birth.

The Black Alliance for Peace condemns the “America COMPETES Act” passed in House of Representatives

The following press release from Black Alliance for Peace, issued on 7 February 2022, correctly identifies the new ‘America COMPETES Act’ as a weapon of Cold War, aimed at strengthening US hegemony and subverting the rise of a democratic, multipolar world order.

February 7, 2022. On Friday evening, February 4th, the U.S. House of Representatives passed the America COMPETES Act of 2022 (H.R. 4521). The stated intent of the legislation is to strengthen “America’s national and economic security and the financial security of families, and advance our leadership in the world.” While this claim, found in Nancy Pelosi’s press statement on January 20th, seems to be addressing some of the most important political and economic issues currently plaguing the United States, from the supply chain to the shortage of semiconductors, the Black Alliance for Peace sees this piece of legislation as sinophobic and militaristic, and that only strengthens the imperialist designs of U.S. foreign policy. 

Continue reading The Black Alliance for Peace condemns the “America COMPETES Act” passed in House of Representatives

China launches Global South economic alliance to challenge US unilateralism

We are very pleased to republish this article by US anti-imperialist journalist Benjamin Norton discussing how China is taking the lead in fashioning an international united front of developing countries against imperialism and in favour of independence, peace and development on both the political and economic fronts. Benjamin notes that the Group of Friends in Defense of the Charter of the United Nations has a stronger core of anti-imperialist and progressive governments promoting its explicitly political agenda whereas the Group of Friends of the Global Development Initiative, launched earlier this month, embraces a considerably broader range of developing countries.

In republishing this article, we also take this opportunity to warmly welcome Benjamin’s new Multipolarista media platform. We wish it every success and look forward to cooperating.

China is leading an international effort to develop alliances to counter US hegemony.

In March 2021, 17 nations — many led by anti-imperialist and progressive governments, including Cuba, Venezuela, Nicaragua, and Bolivia among others — formed a diplomatic alliance called the Group of Friends in Defense of the Charter of the United Nations, which seeks to defend sovereignty and multilateralism against the unilateral domination of the United States and Western Europe.

This January 20, China’s mission to the UN launched a new, economic version of this diplomatic alliance, called the Group of Friends of the Global Development Initiative.

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DSA open letter opposing the US Innovation and Competition Act (USICA)

We are pleased to reproduce and invite support for this Open Letter to US Congressional Representatives, initiated by the International Committee, and its Asia & Oceania and Anti-War Subcommittees of the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA), expressing opposition to the US Innovation and Competition Act (USICA), which they describe as a move “to counter China as part of a New Cold War fuelled by US imperialist interests, which further destabilizes geopolitical relations and jeopardizes efforts toward greater global cooperation on issues affecting everyone worldwide.” The statement decries further militarisation of the Pacific region along with the increased anti-Asian racism and violence in the US and declares:

We believe that US industrial policy should not be built upon imperialist ambitions that serve only to drag the world into a new Cold War. We believe that working people in the US and elsewhere deserve policies that invest in public works programs, climate resilience, infrastructure, healthcare, and more.

The undersigned chapters and members of the Democratic Socialists of America and other allied organizations and individuals strongly condemn Congress’s use of industrial policy and other elements of the proposed US Innovation and Competition Act (USICA) to counter China as part of a new Cold War fueled by US imperialist interests, which further destabilizes geopolitical relations and jeopardizes efforts toward greater global cooperation on issues affecting everyone worldwide.

We call on members of Congress to oppose this aggressive escalation and push back on the narratives that have fueled rising anti-Chinese sentiment in the US, marked by increased anti-Asian racism and violence. We oppose the USICA and other legislation that calls for increased military budgets, further militarization of the Indo-Pacific region, and fosters anti-Chinese propaganda efforts, all based on nothing more than perceived threats to US geopolitical interests. Elected members of the US Congress have the duty to prioritize the needs and concerns of their working class constituents instead of those of arms manufacturers and defense contractors who have fueled decades of endless war at the expense of genuine global cooperation and common prosperity for working class people everywhere.

We believe that US industrial policy should not be built upon imperialist ambitions that serve only to drag the world into a new Cold War. We believe that working people in the US and elsewhere deserve policies that invest in public works programs, climate resilience, infrastructure, healthcare, and more. The US Innovation and Competition Act is not created for those purposes, instead it is overwhelmingly focused on preserving US global hegemony by fabricating narratives aimed at painting China as a threat and riling up global conflict in an effort to undermine an increasingly multipolar world. If enacted, the bill would ramp up interference in the sovereignty of nations throughout the world, establish an anti-Chinese federal bureaucracy, intensify the militarization of US global policies, and continue the legacy of US industrial policy being weaponized against socialist movements globally. This legislation will promote confrontation and conflict with China, escalate the potential for military conflict between nuclear powers, and hinder global cooperation needed to address critical issues like climate change.

For these reasons, we strongly condemn the USICA and urge members of Congress to oppose the bill and call for an end to US policies that threaten hundreds of millions of people in the Indo-Pacific region and could spiral into worldwide conflict.

Zero Covid: China silences the critics

This article by Carlos Martinez, originally published in the Morning Star on 24 January 2022, discusses the recent Covid-19 outbreaks and containment measures in the major Chinese cities of Xi’an and Tianjin. The article addresses the flurry of criticism that has appeared in the Western mainstream media in relation to China’s Zero Covid strategy, and concludes that this criticism is designed specifically to demobilise progressive opinion around developing a people-oriented approach to suppressing the pandemic in the West.

It’s coming up to a year since the last death from Covid in China. Since 26 January 2021, China’s Covid death count has been stuck on 4,636. The vast majority – 99.9 percent – of these deaths took place during the first three months of the pandemic, and the most were in Hubei, the province in which the outbreak was first detected. In the southern province of Guangdong, population 125 million, there have been just eight deaths from Covid.

This extraordinary record has been achieved through strict adherence to a Zero Covid policy. Traditional epidemic containment measures – lockdowns, mass testing, social distancing, mask-wearing, hand-washing – have been combined with advanced technology such as AI-based outbreak modelling. In addition, China developed some of the first vaccines, and so far just under 90 percent of the population has received at least two doses.

The Communist Party government has led an incredible, society-wide mobilisation to suppress SARS-CoV-2 and thereby protect human life.

Continue reading Zero Covid: China silences the critics

NYT equates China’s health workers with Adolf Eichmann

In the infamous words of Joseph Goebbels, Hitler’s propaganda chief: “If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it.”

It would seem that this maxim has been taken to heart by the editors of the New York Times. Every day, this dependable mouthpiece of the US ruling class pumps out a steady diet of increasingly deranged anti-China articles. However, on 13th January, they excelled themselves with a new low – a front page story despicably comparing the public health and medical personnel, who have been bravely fighting an outbreak of Covid in the Chinese city of Xian, to Adolf Eichmann, a key architect of the Holocaust.

We are pleased to publish this excellent and succinct rebuttal of this ‘big lie’ by John Walsh, originally carried by Asia Times. John was until recently a professor at the University of Massachusetts Medical School in the US.

In a article on the front page of The New York Times on January 13, reporter Li Yuan equated the public health and medical personnel behind China’s successful battle against Covid-19 in the city of Xian to Adolf Eichmann, a principal architect of the Holocaust. The article’s opening sentence views these personnel as typical of “the millions of people who work diligently toward” containing Covid-19 in China.  

The anti-Covid campaign in Xian, a city of 13 million, has terminated the spread of Covid-19 without a single death and limited its spread to about 2,000 cases. The Nazi Holocaust designed and managed by Eichmann resulted in the extermination of millions of Jews.  

The piece takes aim at the millions of Chinese who have worked tirelessly to do the rapid mass testing, tracing, quarantining and vaccinations and to staffing the lockdowns including ensuring that those under lockdown were supplied with necessities of life.

Continue reading NYT equates China’s health workers with Adolf Eichmann

Senator Mushahid Hussain on the 3D strategy against China: Demonise, Damage and Destabilise

Speaking at a webinar held on 20 January 2022 by the Islamabad-based think-tank Pakistan-China Institute, Senator Mushahid Hussain, chairman of the Pakistani Senate’s Defense Committee, discusses the motivation and methods of the US-led New Cold War against China. Addressing the Xinjiang situation, Senator Hussain describes the US strategy as being to “demonise, damage and destabilise” in order to put a stop to China’s peaceful rise.

Below the video, we reproduce a report of the event that appeared in Pakistan Today.

Pakistan-China Institute (PCI) organized a first-of-its-kind webinar on the “New Cold War about playing the Xinjiang card against China” under its flagship event series, “Friends of Silk Road (FOSR)”.

The Webinar was attended by over 35 participants online, and featured six speeches, including Dr. Ejaz Akram, Chairman of the Rehmat ul Lil Alameen Authority, Dr. Shireen Mazari, Federal Minister for Human Rights, Professor Li Xiguang, Director of the Center for Pakistan Cultural and Communication at Tsinghua University, Allama Tahir Ashrafi, Special Assistant to the Prime Minister on Religious Affairs, Sabah Aslam, Founder and Executive Director of the Islamabad Institute of Conflict Resolution, and Senator Mushahid Hussain Sayed, Chairman of the Senate Defence Committee and the Pakistan-China Institute.

The dialogue was moderated by Mustafa Hyder Sayed, Executive Director of the Pakistan-China Institute. Mr. Mustafa Hyder Sayed highlighted that the US has weaponized human rights and is engaged in the selective application of human rights principles. He emphasized that Pakistan should continue to support China on Xinjiang since China has always supported Pakistan on its core interests.

Continue reading Senator Mushahid Hussain on the 3D strategy against China: Demonise, Damage and Destabilise

The world needs cooperation, not cold war

We are pleased to republish the following statement, issued recently by the CPUSA Peace & Solidarity Commission and the International Department.

What the world needs is peaceful international relations, equality, global cooperation, and development

What is needed above all in the world today is cooperation among all nations to address existential threats to humanity and indeed life on earth. What is needed now is for all nations to abide by the UN Charter, to join the Treaty to Ban Nuclear Weapons, to honor other nuclear weapons treaties, and to pivot national budgets to dismantling and eliminating nuclear weapons. What is needed above all is immediate action to prevent tectonic environmental shifts. All nations must act together to prevent the observable climate calamities from getting far worse and to seek out solutions to material energy needs that benefit all humankind while protecting the health of the planet. What is needed now is global collaboration to significantly reduce the pandemic through immediate universal access to vaccines and medicines. Making the world safe and humanity healthy should top the priority list of all nations. In particular, the two countries with the biggest economies and biggest impact on earth, the United States and China, along with their partners and allies have the responsibility to cooperate to these ends.

The CPUSA welcomes the joint statement by China and the U.S. on climate cooperation and demands its urgent, practical implementation and extension to other critical domains. Such offers of cooperation have to be deepened, widened, and urgently acted upon.

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Beijing Winter Olympics boycott is the product of imperial jealousy

In this article, first published on CGTN, Danny Haiphong traces the motivation of the ‘diplomatic boycott’ of the Beijing Winter Olympics being carried out by the US and a handful of its allies. Danny observes that the boycott – like the overall New Cold War of which it is a part – is intended to further to central objectives: to undermine China’s accomplishments and to deflect from the shortcomings of the political and economic system prevailing in the major capitalist countries.

In a few weeks, athletes from across the globe will compete in the Winter Olympic Games in Beijing. The Games come amid a challenging period for the world. COVID-19 continues to contribute to greater economic and social instability. Militarism and climate change threaten the future of humanity. Instead of facing these challenges head on, some countries such as the United States have chosen to politicize the upcoming Winter Olympics in Beijing.

The politicization of the Olympics has taken many forms but the most significant is the U.S.-led “diplomatic boycott” of the Games announced early last month, which was justified on the basis of fraudulent and unproven claims of human rights violations in China. Organizations such as the World Uygur Congress and Students for a Free Tibet, both of which receive funding from the National Endowment for Democracy linked with the Central Intelligence Agency, are leading forces in the boycott campaign. The effort has also received bipartisan support in the U.S. Congress, with several Western countries following Joe Biden’s lead. In a blatant act of hypocrisy, 18 U.S. officials applied for visas with plans to visit Beijing during the Games shortly after the announced “diplomatic boycott.”

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China’s solidarity with Tonga and the islands of the Pacific

The eruption of an underwater volcano off the South Pacific island nation of Tonga has triggered a humanitarian crisis, cutting the country off from the outside world and damaging vital connectivity and infrastructure. This once again demonstrates the vulnerability of small island states in particular, faced with the challenges of overcoming centuries of colonial rule, developing their national economies and facing the existential threat of climate change. This useful article, which we reproduce from Global Times, notes that China has pledged all possible support and assistance to Tonga, both now and in the future. China, it further notes, is prepared to cooperate with all other countries in this endeavour and does not wish to see the South Pacific as an arena for any new Cold War. The island nations, it notes, “are not the backyard of the US and its allies”.

The massive eruption of an underwater volcano off Tonga, which triggered tsunami waves to hit the Pacific island nation and other locations in the Pacific, has become a focus of global headlines. 

Tonga is in need of emergency aid, and China said it is willing to help. On Sunday, Chinese Foreign Ministry said that China is ready to provide every possible support and assistance to Tonga. 

We hope those who see Tonga as a battlefield with China, such as the US and its allies, could work together with China to provide help to the Pacific island nation.

While the danger of the Tongan volcano erupting again remaining largely unknown, videos posted on social media and various news reports so far suggest that the eruption has caused serious damages to the island nation. For instance, Tonga’s submarine cable connectivity to the outside world has been offline since Saturday due to the earthquake caused by the volcanic eruption.

Continue reading China’s solidarity with Tonga and the islands of the Pacific

Why we shouldn’t fall for the ‘Chinese influence’ scare at Westminster

We publish below two editorials from the Morning Star (Why we shouldn’t fall for the ‘Chinese influence’ scare at Westminster and China dismisses claims of an agent targeting British MPs) dealing with the absurd recent story about China allegedly buying ‘political influence’ in the British Parliament. The second editorial includes a quote from Friends of Socialist China co-editor Carlos Martinez noting that this escalating reds-under-the-bed narrative is performing the function of repressing individuals and organisations that oppose the West’s reckless New Cold War.

The latest scare over Chinese “influence” at Westminster should be taken with several barrels of salt.

Pointing to the convenience of a national security story being broken at a time when both Downing Street (over “partygate”) and Buckingham Palace (because of Prince Andrew’s increasing vulnerability over sex abuse allegations) could do with distracting the public will invite charges of conspiracy theories.

But the left would be naive to ignore the political role of the intelligence services.

The convention of seeing state institutions which are not party-political as not political at all works to promote the idea that the likes of MI5 are neutral professionals.

Continue reading Why we shouldn’t fall for the ‘Chinese influence’ scare at Westminster

Wang Wenbin debunks myths about human rights abuses in Xinjiang

At the Ministry of Foreign Affairs press conference of 14 January 2022, spokesperson Wang Wenbin gave a detailed response to a question from CGTN about recent US legislation penalizing China for alleged human rights abuses against the Uyghur population in Xinjiang. Wang Wenbin’s response is reproduced below.

For some time now, US politicians, in collusion with some anti-China organizations and individuals, have been unscrupulously spreading and hyping up the lie of “genocide” and “forced labor” in Xinjiang for their ulterior political purpose. Today, I would like to take some time to share with you my experience of debunking lies on Xinjiang and avoid being misled so that you can all see the true face of those who fabricated those lies.

First of all, those who fabricate lies on Xinjiang always camouflage themselves with three cloaks. 

The first is the cloak of academic research. They spread rumors in the name of scholars and academic institutions. A typical example is Adrian Zenz. His claim that “900,000 to 1,800,000 people have been systematically held in detention in Xinjiang” comes from a groundless report by Istiqlal TV, a Turkey-based media organization with close ties with extremists. Abdulkadir Yapuquan, leader of the East Turkistan Islamic Movement (ETIM), a UN listed terrorist organization, is a regular guest of it. Zenz also claimed that 70 percent of the cotton plantations in Xinjiang in 2019 were harvested by human labor. But fact tells a completely different story: 85 percent of the cotton in Xinjiang is harvested by machine. These facts have proved that Adrian Zenz, a so-called “China expert”, is just a pseudo scholar with no academic integrity at all. 

Continue reading Wang Wenbin debunks myths about human rights abuses in Xinjiang

How to satisfy the US Empire: smear the left, demonize China

In this article, first published on The Chronicles of Haiphong, Friends of Socialist China co-editor Danny Haiphong responds to David Klion’s latest report in The Nation, which seeks to demonize China and smear the Western anti-imperialist and pro-socialist movement, within a supposedly left-liberal framework. Danny notes correctly: “Real leftists understand that the American Empire is the biggest obstacle in the way of human progress. They don’t ask, ‘what should the Left do about China?’ Rather, they pose the question, ‘How can the Left develop solidarity with China and the Chinese people in the global struggle against imperialism and oppression of all kinds?'”

Many on the so-called “left” view China and the U.S. as equally oppressive and imperialist in character. This is a historic trend dating back to the Cold War which divided the Western left into a variety of camps. One of these camps was the “Neither Washington nor Moscow” consortium of social democrats and liberals who saw the Soviet Union as an imperialist force unworthy of defense from U.S. aggression. Such a position fit neatly into Washington’s larger imperialist designs and provided cover for the ideological onslaught of anti-communism.

A recent report in The Nation demonstrates how the slogan “Neither Washington nor Moscow” has been replaced with “Neither Washington nor Beijing.” The author, David Klion, concludes that leftists are currently divided into two camps on the question of China: those “apologists” who prioritize peace and critics of China who prioritize “human rights.” Klion closes with a citation from Lausan, a collective that supposedly supports a “decolonial” framework on Hong Kong yet has routinely characterized any leftist opposition to the Western narrative on China as “fascist” or “tankie.”

Continue reading How to satisfy the US Empire: smear the left, demonize China

Keith Lamb: Joint world powers’ statement on nuclear war must be backed up by action

This article by Keith Lamb, republished from CGTN, examines the recent joint statement by China, Britain, France, the US and Russia of their shared determination to avoid nuclear conflict. While this is certainly a positive development, Lamb points out that in a geopolitical context of imperialism, hegemonism, unilateralism and war, the danger of nuclear conflict remains ever-present. He calls on the other nuclear powers to follow China’s lead in adopting a no-first-use policy, and in working towards a multipolar system of international relations based on peace, equality, mutual respect, and sovereign development.

The recent joint statement by China, Britain, France, the U.S. and Russia affirming that “a nuclear war cannot be won and must never be fought… [and] as long as they continue to exist – should serve defensive purposes, deter aggression, and prevent war” is certainly a step in the right direction, by the five nuclear-weapon states.

However, as tensions heat up in Ukraine and the U.S. continues to ignite a new cold war, with China, concrete actions need to back up this lofty language and the historical context of the brutality of atomic weapons must be laid clear so that the states who have the power to reign peace onto the world can take stock and set the correct course for their future actions.

Historically, only the U.S. has ever used the atomic bomb which killed up to an estimated 300,000 primarily old, women and children in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan. Tragically if we believe the likes of General Dwight D. Eisenhower or Admiral William D. Leahy then Japan was already defeated and the atomic option was unnecessary. Thus, the brutal atomic option was more a geopolitical lesson for the USSR.

Continue reading Keith Lamb: Joint world powers’ statement on nuclear war must be backed up by action

Elias Jabbour: Boycotts, hypocrisy and the organic intellectuals of imperialism

In this important article for CGTN, Elias Jabbour discusses the so-called ‘diplomatic boycott’ by some Western countries of the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics, explaining that the boycott forms part of a set of behaviours and slanders that are designed to delegitimise China’s government and to prepare public opinion in the West for further attacks on China. He notes that, sadly, some pseudo-Marxist intellectuals in Europe and North America are participating in this imperialist Cold War project.

It was early December when breaking news took the political and diplomatic circles around the world by surprise: the United States has declared a so-called “diplomatic boycott” of the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics.

According to U.S. government spokeswoman Jen Psaki, the country would not treat the Olympics as something normal given the “atrocities” in Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region. As expected, England and Canada announced something similar later. Same posture Australia. Repeat a lie a thousand times and it becomes the truth?

Since then, EU countries have been pressured to take a similar stance, but for the time being, only Belgium has followed this lead, and in Latin America, there are no signs in this direction. As symbolic as this act can be, it is interesting to note the degree of isolation of U.S. imperialism in countless initiatives.

We must read this attitude in different ways. This “boycott,” although isolated and almost symbolic, is serious. The U.S. doubles its bet on the proliferation of lies for political purposes with a view to delegitimizing the government of the People’s Republic of China in the international community while continuing yet another colonial war.

Let us be under no illusion. What the U.S. plots against China is a colonial war with the purpose of subjugating the country to an order based on violence, blind obedience and punitive wars, applied to those who dare to leave the radar of imperialism’s control. As for the accusations of “genocide” in Xinjiang, the facts show that what we are seeing is an old policy, very similar to what was used by the Nazi propaganda machine. A simple survey is enough to demonstrate that, in reality, these charges are fallacies.

For example, one of the accusations is that China has a policy of mass sterilization, which would have seen the Xinjiang Uygur’s population falling from 15.5 births per thousand to 2.5 per thousand. However, according to the seventh national census report released in May, the Han population growth rate was 4.93 percent, while China’s ethnic minority population increased by 10.26 percent compared to 2010.

Specifically, the population of ethnic minorities in Xinjiang has grown by 14.27 percent in that same period. It is also good to remember that the birth control policies implemented in the early 1980s were not applied to Chinese ethnic minorities.

Another lie concerns the alleged “cultural genocide” preventing Uygur Muslims from freely practicing their religion, including restrictions on the use of their typical clothes and violation of mosques.

However, Xinjiang has more than 24,000 mosques, an average of 530 Muslims per mosque. This number is more than double the total number of existing mosques in the U.S., Britain, Germany and France. On the other side, in the name of “democracy” and “human rights,” U.S. soldiers looted relics from the Historical Museum of Baghdad in 2003.

For that, it is clear that this “boycott” is not supported by data, but by lies and a sea of hypocrisy. The deep contradictions of U.S. society, which was born under the combination of slave labor and reactionary ideologies that support theses such as “indispensable nation,” “manifest destiny” and “New Canaan,” are known by many.

The human rights situation is dire to the point that a 2021 national poll by researcher John Zogby found that 46 percent of the U.S. population believed that a future civil war was likely, another 43 percent thought it was unlikely and 11 percent were unsure.

War seemed more likely for young people (53 percent) than for older ones (31 percent), and for those residing in the South (49 percent) and Central/Great Lakes region (48 percent) compared to those in the East (39 percent).

Meanwhile, a real disaster is taking place in the country with the death of more than 817,000 people by COVID-19. Right-wing ideologies twist the minds of about half of the country’s population by spreading scientific denial, racism and hate crimes against blacks, Latinos and other minorities.

Finally, the new feature of this attempt of a “diplomatic boycott” is the strong resurgence of intellectuals within the so-called progressive camp at the service of the demoralization of socialist experiences.

This was something very common during the Cold War, and was usually due to the co-option, by imperialism, of European Marxist intellectuals, that were induced to criticize the former Soviet Union. Now, there are figures like the philosopher Slavoj Zizek, signatory of a petition pressing the French government to “boycott” the Winter Olympics.

The cultural war against China involves the mobilization of “intellectuals” to criticize China. History repeats itself, but now as farce.

Have you been lied to about Xinjiang, human rights − and China?

This statement from the International Action Center thoroughly dismantles US-led imperialist propaganda about alleged human rights abuses in Xinjiang, and exposes how these are being leveraged to build public support for a reckless and aggressive anti-China strategy that offers nothing to ordinary people in the West.

Claiming that it is acting in defense of human rights, the U.S. tries to cover its own criminal record on internal human rights violations and its record of endless wars, assassinations, coups and devastating sanctions by making charges and targeting other countries.

Propaganda fuels U.S. wars 

The “2021 Annual Threat Assessment of the U.S. Intelligence Community,” issued April 9 by Avril Haines, Director of National Intelligence, labeled China as “the greatest threat to the United States.” Numerous other reports and official statements claim Washington must prepare an intensifying level of U.S. intelligence operations, cyberattacks and investment in military technology to counter China.

The U.S. military has encircled China. With joint Democratic and Republican Party backing, the U.S. has imposed economic sanctions, an onerous trade war and canceled cultural exchanges and visas for tens of thousands of Chinese students. This campaign is cynically justified as a defense of human rights.

Continue reading Have you been lied to about Xinjiang, human rights − and China?

Slanders about China’s treatment of Uyghurs are aimed at bolstering the military-industrial complex

Interviewed by Jacquie Luqman for Sputnik’s By Any Means Necessary radio show, Friends of Socialist China co-editor Carlos Martinez discusses the US’s new Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act and the Washington Post’s ‘smoking gun’ report linking Huawei to surveillance technology in Xinjiang. The full radio show can be found here.