– Dr Gulrez Sheikh
The Inter-Parliamentary Alliance on China has been growing with more than 100 lawmakers from a dozen countries. Since the alliance consists of 4 Republicans & 4 Democrats, it fixes the ideological issues in the U.S. Besides the US and EU, there are lawmakers from opposing parties from Australia, Canada, the Czech Republic, Germany, Italy, Japan, Lithuania, the Netherlands, Norway, Sweden, and the UK.
Recent enactment of a national security law for Hong Kong is another nail in the Chinese diplomatic coffin, with Trump administration planning to withdraw the city’s designation as autonomous. The UK is talking about extending a path to British citizenship to nearly 3 million people living there.
The making of such a group to counter Beijing’s new forcefulness is in itself not just a important step but also a natural development. It is a loud message to the Chinese leadership that the frustration with China’s overreach is not merely limited to India or the US.
The British human rights worker, Luke de Pulford, who spent several months last year with the pro democratic protestors in Hong Kong, worked extensively in bringing together politicians from different countries and point of views on a single platform. If it holds together, the alliance can pose a big challenge to Beijing.
However, the group must be open to any parliamentarian across the globe on lines of human rights issues and not merely become an anti-China vehicle. If it is just an anti-China vehicle, it will make Chinese PR easy by calling it a west propagated propaganda against the communist state. Since China’s human rights records are bleak, countering these questions won’t be easy for the “Wolf Warrior Diplomats”.
The alliance must call for debates on humanitarian crises in Hong Kong, Xinjiang, the HAN Chinese domination of erstwhile Manchuria, Tibet, Inner Mongolia & keeping these lands underdeveloped. For any concrete action the alliance needs to balance the individual member country’s interests.
The strongest glue for the alliance can be the Made in China, new “Wolf Warrior Diplomacy”, as against the Deng Xiaoping’s diplomacy which mainstreamed the sick man of Asia. Most importantly, the group must reach out to developing countries in order to check the Chinese influence in these regions.
EU Resolution for a probe into the source of the Corona virus backed by 120+ countries
In mid-May, when the world was seeking answers to the source of Corona, China did everything to block any effort into investigating into the source of Corona. However, a European Union forwarded resolution tabled at the World Health Assembly (WHA) on May 18th was supported by 120+ countries including India. China was forced to eventually back the resolution.
The WHA meeting was held in MAy this year amid the global anger and concerns over the COVID-19 which first emerged in Chinese city of Wuhan. The role of China and WHO and its Director General Dr Tedros in the Pandemic have been criticised by countries worldwide. India is on the Executive Board of the WHA replacing Japan.
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