I thought you might find this statement from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the People’s Republic of China interesting as I did. I don’t actually have much to say about it other than that I found this passage interesting:
Third, we have followed an open regionalism to build a stable and prosperous Asian home together.
I wonder if that’s how Japan, South Korea, Philippines, and India see it?
hmm a Greater Asian Co-Prosperity Sphere?
India and Philippines have active border disputes with China, the Indian-China border had a shooting incident lately, and Japan and South Korea are American vassal states. So we can guess what those four think of China.
However, all of them and 10 others are members of the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership, the largest free-trade region in the world: Australia, New Zealand, Brunei Darussalam, Cambodia, China, Japan, Laos, Singapore, Thailand, Vietnam, Republic of Korea, and Malaysia.
Some Latin American countries, like Mexico and Chile, have expressed interest in joining the RCEP.
The RCEP replaces the Trans-Pacific Partnership that Trump cancelled.
China is also a member of BRICS+, the SCO, and cooperates with the EAEU run by China. Numerous countries in Asia, Africa, and South America are participating in the China-run OBOR/BRI.
China is the main trading partner of almost every country on Earth. It has numerous mutually profitable exchanges with all of them. It is not only the largest producer of goods and services on the planet, it is the largest consumer of raw materials, food and many finished goods.
China is at the very center of the world economy. Its total economy is at least one-third larger than the US’, and its manufacturing sector is at least 50% larger than ours, and much more modern, high tech, and comprehensive–socks to space stations.
Unfortunately, it is America, us, that is becoming ever more isolated from the world. It is the US that is despised in Africa and Latin America and much of Asia. Even many Western Europeans, especially Germans, hate us. All of that hate and anger arises because of our world empire, an empire we police and maintain with brutality. Ask any Somali, or Afghan, or Iraqi, or Syrian, of Libyan, or Serb, or Irani or Yemeni.
For that matter, ask any Ukrainian who was on the receiving end of the coup we ran in 2014, the coup that ended Ukraine’s democratically elected government and installed the current fascist junta.
The regime in Washington (don’t pretend we elect it) is the most violent government on the planet. Except for 15 years, we have been at war continuously since our Declaration of Independence. The Indian Wars lasted officially from the very first settlement, Jamestown in 1607, until the Battle of Bear Valley in 1918. There is also the Second Wounded Knee protest in 1973 led by Russel Means. Oglala and AIM members held the town for 71 days.
We need to stop worrying about Xi and Putin and start worrying about the criminals in Washington. They are the problem.
China has been very clear for a long time that they intend to build an international system with them at the center to compete with and displace the system currently led by the US. I see that third item is simply a part of that larger strategy.