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U.S. Claims Diplomatic Immunity For Covid-19 – Shuts Down Chinese Consulate
On Tuesday the U.S. government ordered the closure of the Chinese consulate in Houston, Texas. The move comes amongst a slew of factless accusations of Chinese hacking and surveillance.
While Trump, like Biden, is using anti-China propaganda as part of his campaign, the closure of the Houston consulate has nothing to do with it. But U.S. media fail to mention the real and unreasonable motive behind this move:
The United States ordered China to close its diplomatic consulate in Houston within 72 hours, dealing another blow to the rapidly deteriorating relations between the two countries. China promptly vowed to retaliate, calling the move illegal.
The State Department said the closure was made in response to repeated Chinese violations of American sovereignty, including “massive illegal spying and influence operations.”
The unmentioned reason for the State Department's move is a squabble over virus testing and quarantining of U.S. diplomats who are supposed to return to China.
In January, when the first outbreak of Covid-19 happened in the Chinese city of Wuhan the U.S. evacuated its consulate in the city. In total some 1,300 diplomats and their family members were moved out of China in January and February.
In June, after China had defeated the outbreak, the U.S. announced that that it diplomats would return:
U.S. ambassador to China, Terry Branstad, “intends to resume operations in Wuhan in the near future”, Frank Whitaker, minister counselor for Public Affairs at the embassy, said in an email to Reuters, without giving a specific date.
But by then the U.S. had become Cootiestan while China had defeated the virus. Chinese public health officials insisted on testing and quarantining everyone who entered from the U.S. to protect their country from another outbreak.
The State Department however rejected that:
The United States has postponed flights for dozens of American diplomats who had planned to return to China later this month, after failing to reach agreement with Beijing over issues including COVID-19 testing and quarantine.
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In a previously unreported June 30 email, Terry Branstad, the U.S. ambassador to China, told the mission staff that two charter flights for diplomats returning to Shanghai and Tianjin planned for July 8 and July 10 respectively had been scrapped and would be rescheduled.
“Protecting the health and safety of our community remains our guiding principle and our top priority in this unprecedented situation,” Branstad wrote. “This means that flight plans will not be confirmed until we have reached an agreement that meets these goals.”
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A spokesperson for China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs said there had been close communication regarding the return of U.S. diplomats to China.
“The virus is still spreading overseas and China continues to be under a fair amount of pressure to prevent the import of cases from overseas,” the spokesperson said in fax response to Reuters’ questions.
“The epidemic control measures for the diplomatic corps in China are applied equally across the board. China strives to preserve its hard-won achievement in countering the virus together with the diplomatic corps, and to provide good conditions and a good living environment for everyone to work and live in China.”
I have found no U.S. media which reported on this diplomatic conflict. Only Reuters and Asia Times noted it.
China's request to test and to quarantine for fourteen days everyone who is coming from abroad is not unreasonable. New York, New Jersey and Connecticut demand similar for people coming from Florida and Texas. China has already had an expensive second outbreak with several hundred of cases in Beijing that was traced back to a visitor from abroad. It does not want another one.
The U.S. says that its diplomats are immune under the Vienna Conventions. But Chinese officials claim that the virus is not a party of those agreements. They insist that legal and disease immunity are not the same:
While Beijing agrees that US envoys and emissaries should retain their diplomatic immunity, China’s public health authority insists no one is immune to the highly contagious novel coronavirus, and that the nation must not expose itself to the risk of returning Americans infecting the local population.
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Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Zhao Lijian said on Thursday that Beijing would accord courteous and equitable treatment to all foreign representatives. He also revealed that his ministry had already “fast-tracked procedures” and helped a “plane load” of US diplomats to return to China at the end of May, without confirming if they had all been quarantined upon arrival.
On his Weibo account, Zhao also took a swipe at Washington’s call for China to be more hospitable, saying if US President Donald Trump wants Americans to feel more welcome elsewhere, he should “make America well again,” alluding to the alarming resurgence of the respiratory disease across the country.
But other posts on Weibo noted that when the first batch of about 60 US diplomats flew into Tianjin at the end of May, they were immediately flanked by more than 150 paramedics in hazmat gear, who whisked them to a fully-enclosed facility on the tarmac to collect their saliva samples. These Americans then spent more hours than their flight to China waiting in a partitioned lounge before Chinese doctors could given them a clean slate and allow them to leave.
The squabble continues. The U.S. diplomats have not returned and the consulate in Wuhan has still not reopened. The U.S. order to close the Chinese consulate in Houston is obviously an attempt to press China into lifting its testing and quarantine demands for U.S. diplomats.
The BBC falsely claimed that the Houston consulate was ordered to close because of a fire:
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That however turns cause and effect around. The consulate in Houston started to burn its confidential papers after it was informed that it had to close within 72 hours:
The consulate was informed of the decision Tuesday, Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson Wang Wenbin said, calling it "an outrageous and unjustified move that will sabotage relations between the two countries."
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KHOU-TV reports authorities responded to reports of a fire at the Chinese Consulate. Witnesses said people were burning paper in what appeared to be trash cans, the Houston Chronicle reported, citing police.
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Houston police said in a tweet that officers responded to "a meet the firefighter" call at the Chinese Consulate building at 3417 Montrose Blvd. The tweet said smoke was observed in an outdoor courtyard area, and that officers were not allowed to enter the building.
The real motive for the consulate closure can be discerned from the State Department's coded statement:
The U.S., in a brief statement, did not provide any details on why the consulate in Texas was targeted.
"The United States will not tolerate (China's) violations of our sovereignty and intimidation of our people, just as we have not tolerated (its) unfair trade practices, theft of American jobs, and other egregious behavior," said the statement, which was attributed to State Department spokesperson Morgan Ortagus.
The "violations of our sovereignty and intimidation of our people" are an obvious reference to the Chinese demands towards arriving diplomats.
In a tit for tat reaction the Chinese government is likely to permanently close the U.S. consulate in Wuhan:
Late on Tuesday in Houston, media reported that documents had been burned in a courtyard at the consulate. Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin said the consulate was operating normally, declining to comment further on those reports.
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“We urge the U.S. to immediately revoke this erroneous decision. Should it insist on going down this wrong path, China will react with firm countermeasures.”
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A source with direct knowledge of the matter said China was considering closing the U.S. consulate in Wuhan, where the State Department withdrew staff and their families early this year amid the coronavirus outbreak that first emerged in the central city.
Closing the consulate in Wuhan will of course solve the problem for the U.S. diplomats who left Wuhan during the January outbreak and now expect to be allowed to return without being tested.
That all U.S. media which I have read on the issue have failed to mention the diplomatic spat about testing should be of concern.
But it of course relieves them from explaining the unreasonable behavior of the State Department which demands that its cooties infested diplomats can return to China without taking the necessary precautions.
Before I went for a leave of absence to Germany because of family-matters,I lived & worked almost 10 years in Beijing (headquarter location)and traveled throughout China & Asia (and I’ll return after my task is over).I must say this ONE is one of those few articles which get an rather acurate picutre of its subjects.
Normally, especially in the USA it’s rather “Märchenstunde”( something like tall tales)than anything else. Also tons of half-tuth, “hearsay”, unknown sources, doctored statistics aka Forbes & Bloomberg (UNI of Munich found out after they checked F&BB articles of the last 20years, that almost 75% turned out as WRONG in its predictions or were fabricated from the start!). So a dire situation for
some truth and realistic reporting instead it’s all the American propaganda-blah-blah you can imagine.
Right now ridiculously HK and EVIL-China-hurting/killing-Moslems (educate yourself https://www.greanvillepost.com/2019/07/17/a-xinjiang-update-by-godfree-roberts/ or https://www.unz.com/author/godfree-roberts/)- says WAR-CRIMINAL + MASS-MURDER Pompeo,lol!
Nonetheless you find such reflections, racist prejudices (sorry there’s no other word to go for), other utter nonsense and so on… in many, many comments here, who mostly have no idea what they blaring about.
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/55357.htm
https://sputniknews.com/analysis/202007161079899396-why-the-us-has-no-chance-of-winning-either-a-cold-or-a-hot-war-against-china/
Why the US Has No Chance of Winning Either a ‘Cold’ or a ‘Hot’ War Against China
By Ekaterina Blinova
July 16, 2020 “Information Clearing House” – While ramping up pressure against Beijing on multiplefronts, Washington appears to not be taking into account China’s sustainability and resilience, which stem from its sophisticated culture, says sociologist Dr. Heinz Dieterich, explaining why the
US’ current China strategy is erratic and doomed to failure.
On Monday, US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo announced that “most” of China’s maritime claims in the South China Sea are null and void. The People’s Republic claims up to 80% of the 3.5-million square kilometre sea, in accordance with the so-called “nine dash line”.
“The world will not allow Beijing to treat the South China Sea as its maritime empire”, Pompeo stated.
In response, the Chinese embassy in the US warned the Trump administration against “stirring up tension and inciting confrontation in the region.”
Washington Stepping Up Pressure Against Beijing
The latest spat came on the heels of tit-for-tat sanctions against senior politicians implemented by Washington and then Beijing over Xinjiang as well as the US show of force in the South China Sea earlier this month. The Trump administration is continuing to tighten the screws on China’s trade,
high-tech sector, and artificial island building. According to public opinion polls, anti-China sentiment is now on the rise in the US, with about 66% of Americans thinking unfavourably about the People’s Republic, prompting speculations about a forthcoming “cold war” with Beijing.
However, at the same time, the US Chamber of Commerce has recently demanded that top Chinese officials redouble efforts to implement phase one of the trade agreement which was concluded between Washington and Beijing in January 2020.
“Any scientifically sound metric of international standing – economic, scientific, demographic, political, military or Covid-19 – shows, that the US is in no condition to either win a ‘cold’ or ‘hot war’ against China”, says Dr. Heinz Dieterich, director of the Centre for Transition Sciences (CTS) at the
Autonomous Metropolitan University in Mexico City, and coordinator at the World Advanced Research Project (WARP).
Washington´s China strategy is erratic and being coupled with the internal partisan and social divide which has manifested as a systemic crisis in the US, he remarks.You can’t buy your way onto these pages.The crisis is systemic, because it has affected political, economic, cultural and social dimensions. It dramatically evidenced the breakdown of the intra-elite consensus between Democrats and Republicans on how to preserve the global US domination-system. It has also aggravated longstanding social inequality, skyrocketing national debt and swirling protests, the professor notes.
Besides endangering the country’s internal stability, it threatens to affect the global balance of power and world peace, Dieterich warns.
The Demise of the Transatlantic Partnership
While the US is now praising the UK’s decision to ban Chinese telecom equipment from its 5G networks, the Trump administration cannot boast good relations with the European Union, as it has largely alienated Germany, “the undisputed leader” of the bloc.
On 29 June, German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas warned that the current tensions between the US and Germany are unlikely to be solved in the foreseeable future, no matter who wins the November vote: “Everyone who thinks everything in the trans-Atlantic partnership will be as it once was with a Democratic president underestimates the structural changes,” Maas told the German press agency DPA.
The Trump administration has repeatedly lambasted Berlin over NATO spending, migration and economic policies, as well as its participation in the Russia-led Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline project, which was recently subjected to US sanctions.
At the same time, the US open policy of intimidation against China, Russia, North Korea and Iran has proven ineffective and failed, according to the academic. Iran’s delivery of about 1.5 million barrels of Iranian gasoline and related components to Venezuela, a country suffering from a US embargo, in May and June 2020, clearly indicated that Washington’s policy of “maximum pressure”
against nuclear or powerful states does not work.
Despite sabre-rattling and muscle flexing in the South China Sea, the US is unlikely to engage in a direct confrontation with the People’s Republic as it is doomed to failure, according to Dieterich, who recollects that the US has de facto “lost” four wars in Asia: China’s civil war (1946-49), the Korean
War (1950-53), the Vietnam War (1955-75), and most recently in Afghanistan.
“My Center for Transition Sciences (CTS) has developed a multi-variable ‘Geopolitical Index of Relative Power of Nation-States’ (GIRP), which we presented in Moscow in 2014 that clearly shows that the US and its allies would have won a nuclear war against China in the 1950s. But, even against the lightly armed peasant army of Mao Zedong, they could not win the Korean War,” the professor notes.
The US as a superpower is today only “a shadow of what it was after 1945”, according to the academic, who claims that it has turned from a “tiger with nuclear teeth” (as Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchov defined it) into a “paper tiger” (as Mao Zedong called it).
US Underestimates China’s Sustainability
Touching upon the massive pressure the US has exerted on China’s economic, social and political spheres, as well as raising stakes in the South China Sea, Dieterich presumes that Washington underestimates China’s resilience based on its sophisticated culture and “dialectical spirit of Confucius, Lao-Tse, and Gautama Buddha” which have many times helped the nation overcome dramatic historical challenges and paved the way to its socio-economic and political transformation.
He notes that if one takes a look at the past two centuries, one would see that the Chinese managed to fend of the Japanese intervention, survived the Civil War, and proved sufficient in the Korean and Vietnam wars. IT successfully underwent the Cultural Revolution under Mao Zedong and then further socio-cultural transformation under Deng Xiaoping. Currently, he says, Chinese
society is making a dramatic technological leap striving to accomplish its Made in China 2025 strategic plan under Xi Jinping.
“These successes have produced an overwhelming support of the people for the government, a strong national unity behind a clear strategic leadership, based on the scientific principles of Marxism, and an international global power and standing in all important metrics,” Dieterich says.
The Chinese are not sitting on their thumbs while the US is trying to build an anti-China coalition; the People’s Republic is actively forging multilateral alliances and strengthening ties with Russia and the Germany-led European Union.
Thus, Beijing is pushing ahead with the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP), a proposed free trade agreement in the Indo-Pacific region, which brings together the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) and its FTA partners, namely, China, Australia, Japan, New Zealand, and South Korea. Furthermore, the People’s Republic is signalling a “positive and open
attitude” towards joining the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP), an “updated” version of the Obama-era Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) shredded by Donald Trump when he assumed the office.
To preserve the global balance of power, Washington should adhere to a symmetrical multi-polar world and give up plans of “subjugating China, Russia and Europe, in order to recuperate its former world supremacy”, according to the professor. “Democracy and Justice in the world system are only possible between entities, which roughly have the same amount of power,” he remarks.
“The only stable and viable solution for the species to survive is a new eco-civilisation, based on a global non-market economic system, in which the private tyranny of the market – a global plutocratic elite of profit mongers – and anti-democratic oligarchic political systems do no longer rule the destiny of the people,” Dieterich concludes.
Posted by: Ashino |
Posted by: Ashino | Jul 23 2020 13:43 utc | 144
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