Peking [China]Oct 1 (ANI): Containment of China has become a priority for liberal democracies across the world due to the Asian giant’s dismal record on human rights and its apparent threats to its neighbours’ territorial sovereignty, as well as concerns that China is out to to impose their ways of thinking and their values on other countries.
In addition, the US-led global containment of China accelerates the process of Beijing’s isolation in the global arena. Human rights abuses in Xinjiang, Hong Kong and Tibet have prompted the US and EU to issue sanctions against several Chinese government officials and companies, The Singapore Post reported.
Concerns about Beijing’s intentions among China’s neighbors such as the littoral states in the South China Sea are understandable. Still, even distant Nordic countries such as Denmark and Norway, which are NATO members, and Sweden and Finland, which have applied for NATO membership, are now wary of China, The Singapore Post reported.
Gone are the days when these countries had signed memorandums of understanding with Beijing welcoming the establishment of the China-led Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank in the northern regions.
Now with the reality of the “re-education camps”, a euphemism for torture centers, in Xinjiang, the protests against the violation of human rights in Hong Kong and the threat from Beijing to the security of Taiwan, there has been a fundamental change in the Nordic countries’ view of China; these countries are now losing confidence in China and consider it a security threat.
There is also concern in the liberal democratic countries about the threat to national security from China; because the Chinese leaders will not shrink from achieving their goals by force, The Singapore Post reported. Going by recent claims by Chinese President Xi Jinping that Buddhism and Islam must adapt to the ways of the Chinese Communist Party and the censorship and control under which the church must operate in China, these concerns are not unfounded.
In Asia, which Beijing regards as its backyard, Japan has emerged as the vanguard in resisting China, worried about the Chinese threat. Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida has participated in NATO summits. Japan actively supports NATO’s expansion into Asia.
With China frequently violating its southwestern borders with India, New Delhi has become a member of the US-led Quadrilateral Alliance, in which Japan is also a member as is Australia. In a message to China, the US, UK and Australia have formed the Indo-Pacific Trilateral Alliance. Australia faces a growing threat from China in its zone of influence among the Pacific Islands.
It is believed that China is now at its most isolated since the imposition of international sanctions against the country in 1989, in the wake of the Tiananmen Square massacre. With autocratic tendencies manifesting in the CPC leadership, liberal democratic countries around the world are becoming more wary of China, The Singapore Post reported.
One of the most embarrassing manifestations of this isolation has been Britain’s recent refusal of permission for a high-level Chinese government delegation to attend Queen Elizabeth’s lie-in-state at Westminster Hall in the Parliament complex in London before the funeral at Westminster Abbey on September 19, 2022. (ANI)
Source: sn.dk