China’s diplomats aren’t being very diplomatic.
In the past few months, its envoy to Canada publicly accused his hosts of “white supremacy,” its ambassador in Sweden labeled the Swedish police “inhumane” and blasted the country’s “so-called freedom of expression,” and its chief emissary in South Africa said President Donald Trump’s policies were making the U.S. “the enemy of the whole world.”
“I don’t think we are witnessing a pattern of misstatements and slips of the tongue,” said Ryan Hass, a fellow at the Brookings Institution who previously oversaw China affairs at the U.S. National Security Council. “We seem to be watching China’s diplomats matching the mood of the moment in Beijing. Beijing rewards diplomats that are aggressive advocates of China’s views and scorns those that it perceives as overly timid.”
That may be damaging Xi Jinping’s efforts to win friends abroad and capitalize on Donald Trump’s international unpopularity. While China has seized on the trade war and U.S. disengagement abroad to pitch itself as a champion of globalization, 63 percent of respondents to a 2018 Pew poll in 25 countries said they preferred the U.S. as a world leader, compared with 19 percent for China.
At stake is China’s avowed goal of establishing itself as a global superpower with influence over a network of allies to balance U.S. influence. China is pouring billions into global efforts such as Xi’s Belt and Road Initiative to forge stronger links with countries around the world.
But China’s increasingly strident diplomatic approach could do more harm than good. Anti-China sentiment has played a pivotal role in election surprises across Asia, and more countries around the world are becoming skeptical of Chinese investment — particularly in telecommunications, with fears growing about using its equipment in 5G networks because of concerns about espionage.
China’s foreign ministry didn’t respond to faxed questions about the more aggressive language from diplomats. After Trump took office, China has sought to portray itself as a supporter of the international order, with Xi himself defending globalization at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. His charm offensive stood in contrast to Trump, who has reshaped public discourse with regular insults of other world leaders on Twitter.
Even so, foreign diplomats in Beijing say that the behavior of Chinese officials has become far more aggressive and assertive in private meetings in recent years. Their discussions have become more ideological, according to one senior foreign envoy, who described the behavior as a strong sense of grievance combined with increasing entitlement about China’s international role and rights.
Chinese diplomats’ advocacy for the country’s beleaguered tech giant, Huawei Technologies Co., has even riled heads of government. After the Chinese ambassador to the Czech Republic, Zhang Jianmin, announced in November that the Czech cyber security body’s decision to ban Huawei did not represent the view of the Czech government, Prime Minister Andrej Babis said, “I do not know what the ambassador is talking about,” according to Czech Radio.
In some regions, China’s overseas rhetoric has been hardening for years. Foreign officials noticed an increasingly strident tone from Beijing following the global financial crisis. At a 2010 meeting hosted by Southeast Asian nations in Hanoi, then foreign minister Yang Jiechi famously dismissed some of China’s neighbors as “small countries” when challenged over Beijing’s stance in the South China Sea.
Foreign diplomats said the outbursts have increased in both frequency and intensity since Xi took power in 2012. In the last few years, South Korea, the Philippines, Australia and now Canada have all incurred Beijing’s wrath, with diplomatic barbs often accompanied by economic pressure through import restrictions, store inspections and safety warnings to Chinese tour groups.
In a speech at the 2017 Communist Party conclave that saw Xi appointed for a second term as party chief without an apparent successor, Xi described China as “standing tall and firm in the East” and pledged to make the country a global leader in innovation, influence and military might. At a conference for Chinese ambassadors at the end of that year, Xi urged diplomats to play a more proactive part in an increasingly multipolar world — a speech China’s ambassador to the United Kingdom described as a “mobilization order,” or “bugle call.”
China’s diplomatic corps has been quick to show its loyalty to Xi. In a 2017 essay in the party’s theoretical magazine Qiushi, top diplomat Yang Jiechi pledged to study and implement Xi’s thought on diplomacy in a “deep-going way.” And Foreign Minister Wang Yi recently praised Xi for “taking the front line of history” and “braving 10,000 crags and torrents.”
“Chinese ambassadors always feel they have to speak to the leaders in Beijing more than to the local public. Their promotions depend on it,” said Susan Shirk, a former U.S. deputy assistant Secretary of State for East Asia. “If today what they say is more overtly anti-American or anti-Western then that reflects the changing foreign policy line.”
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