Con Coughlin
Chinese ambassadors, particularly those based
in Western capitals, simply resort to blackmail, threatening to deny
governments vital medical supplies to cope with the pandemic if they do not
comply with Beijing's wishes.
All these countries have good reason to want to
stand their ground against Beijing. Italy has been the target of a skilful fake
news campaign by Beijing with cleverly edited videos that show Italians showing
their gratitude for China's help in the pandemic when no such demonstrations
took place.
The French government was outraged after the
Chinese embassy in Paris accused French care-workers of abandoning their posts,
thereby causing elderly residents to die; while Germany has complained that
Chinese diplomats tried to pressure officials to make positive statements on
how Beijing was handling the coronavirus pandemic.
As the EU, by constantly capitulating to
Beijing's demands, has shown it is totally incapable of protecting the
interests of member states, the governments of Europe are finally waking up to
the reality that, in order to defend themselves against China's bully-boy
tactics, they will have to look after themselves.
The latest capitulation by the European Union
in the face of Chinese intimidation demonstrates that, when it comes to
protecting the interests of member states, the Brussels bureaucracy is no match
for Beijing's new breed of warrior diplomats.
Since the start of the coronavirus pandemic,
one of the more notable features of China's response has been the willingness
of senior Chinese diplomats to intervene forcibly in defence of China's
interests.
The interventions of these "Wolf
Warrior" diplomats, so-called after a series of iconic Chinese action movies in which
Chinese special forces vanquish their American foes, take several forms.
On one level, Chinese ambassadors, particularly
those based in Western capitals, simply resort to blackmail, threatening to deny governments
vital medical supplies to cope with the pandemic if they do not comply with
Beijing's wishes.
On another level, they indulge in disseminating
fake news, using
social media platforms to propagate information that is patently false.
To deal with the growing menace posed by
China's diplomatic community, it is vital, therefore, that the West take robust
action to protect its interests, and to hold China to account for its role in
causing the pandemic in the first place, and then trying to cover its
culpability by launching a global campaign to conceal the origins of the
outbreak.
Unfortunately, so far as the EU is concerned,
the Brussels establishment has proved itself to be little more than a paper
tiger when it comes to dealing with China's more aggressive diplomatic
approach, as can be seen from the EU's most recent act of appeasement towards
Beijing. The latest
controversy concerns
an article written by Nicolas Chapuis, the EU's ambassador to China, which was
conceived to mark the 45th anniversary of EU-China diplomatic relations, and
was also signed by all 27 EU country national ambassadors in Beijing.
The article was written for publication in the
state-owned China Daily newspaper, but ran into trouble when
China's foreign ministry objected to a reference in the article which suggested
the coronavirus pandemic originated in China. The offending passage referred to
the "outbreak of the coronavirus in China, and its subsequent spread to
the rest of the world."
The article eventually appeared in print, but
not before EU officials had agreed to remove this passage, prompting Mr Chapuis
to remark, "It is of course regrettable
to see that the sentence about the spread of the virus has been edited."
The EU's willingness to concede to Beijing's
bully-boy tactics is not the first time in recent weeks that Brussels has been
forced to capitulate to Chinese intimidation. Last month, the EU amended a
report into
China's disinformation campaign in Europe following pressure from Chinese
officials. This prompted one outraged EU official to complain that the EU was
"self-censoring to appease the Chinese Communist Party."
In this latest example of Brussels kowtowing to
Beijing, the EU only has itself to blame: by seeking to publish the article, it
was deliberately seeking to pivot towards
China in what
appeared to be a European attempt to seize upon a perceived lack of U.S.
leadership during the pandemic.
Apart from making itself look weak and
incompetent, the failure to publish the article in full has angered a number of
European governments, who have themselves been targeted by Beijing's aggressive
diplomatic tactics. This resulted in the Beijing embassies of countries such as
Germany, France and Italy publishing the letter in full, complete with the
reference originating in China and spreading from there to the rest of the
world.
All these countries have good reason to want to
stand their ground against Beijing. Italy has been the target of a
skilful fake news
campaign by
Beijing with cleverly edited videos that show Italians showing their gratitude
for China's help in the pandemic when no such demonstrations took place.
The French government was outraged after the
Chinese embassy in Paris accused French care-workers of abandoning their posts,
thereby causing elderly residents to die; while Germany has complained that Chinese diplomats tried
to pressure officials to make positive statements on how Beijing was handling
the coronavirus pandemic.
As the EU, by constantly capitulating to
Beijing's demands, has shown it is totally incapable of protecting the
interests of member states, the governments of Europe are finally waking up to
the reality that, in order to defend themselves against China's bully-boy
tactics, they will have to look after themselves.
Con Coughlin is the Telegraph's Defence and Foreign
Affairs Editor and a Distinguished Senior Fellow at Gatestone
Institute.14-5-2020
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