Yang told US Secretary of State Antony Blinken and National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan that American-style democracy order no longer suited the needs of the world’s 7.7 billion people.
“The US has its style of democracy and China has its style of democracy,” he said.
American democracy,in Yang’s account,has started wars,jailed black citizens at three times the rate of their population,and allowed COVID-19 to run rampant.
The Chinese-style of democracy has never been more popular,Yang said. It has eliminated absolute poverty and achieved a “strategic victory” over COVID-19.
“We believe that it is important for the US to change its own image and to stop advancing its own democracy in the rest of the world.”
China,emboldened by a coterie of nations in eastern Europe,south-east Asia,Africa and South America to whom it gives patronage in return for international support,is now staking its ground. It is carving out its own sphere of influence among countries that feel marginalised by the West.
“What China and the international community follow and uphold is the United Nations centred international system,” said Yang.
“Not what is advocated by a small number of countries of the so-called rules-based international order.”
This rules-based order has seen the US,Australia,Britain and others condemn China’s incursions in the South China Sea,treatment of Uighurs in Xinjiang and erosion of democracy in Hong Kong.
“This situation must no longer continue,” said Wang. “China urges the US side to abandon the hegemonic practice of interfering in China’s affairs. It is time for it to change.”
Yang noted that ASEAN has now become China’s largest trading partner,overtaking the European Union and the United States. Japan and South Korea were second and third.
“Whether judged by population scale or the trend of the world,the western world does not represent the global public opinion,” said Yang.
Blinken,who had just returned from South Korea and Japan,felt he had to respond. Foreign officials had been gossiping behind China’s back.
“I have to tell you what I am hearing is very different from what you described,” he said.
“I am hearing deep satisfaction that the US is back. That we are re-engaged with our allies and partners. I am also hearing deep concern about some of the actions your government is taking.”
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Beneath the rhetoric,China’s own public lack of self-awareness remains its biggest hurdle to achieving what its economy has long promised:international respect.
It condemns the treatment of black Americans and Indigenous Australians while imprisoning,sterilising and torturing Uighurs.
It says it has eliminated absolute poverty but has a per-capita GDP one-sixth of the United States.
It says its values are the same as the common values of humanity “peace,development,fairness,justice,freedom and democracy” but it has wiped out theopposition in Hong Kong and built a justice system with a 99 per cent conviction rate.
“The fact is there are many problems within the US regarding human rights which the US has admitted itself,” said Yang.
Indeed,said Sullivan.
“A confident country is able to look hard at its own shortcomings”.