China on the axis of evil

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) recently readjusted its global GDP forecasts downwards again, highlighting the economic fall from an estimated -3% last April to -4.9% released a few days ago as a forecast for 2020. 

Among the considerations of the international organization, of the twenty turbine economies of the world, only China will grow 1%, all the others will suffer serious collapses: United States -8%; Germany -7.8%; United Kingdom -10.2%; Japan -5.8%; Spain and Italy will fall -12. 8%, respectively; France -12.5%; Brazil -9.1%; Mexico -10.5%; Canada -8.4%, Russia -6.6% and even India which this year was forecast to grow above 7% to exceed China's GDP estimated between 6.1% and 6.3% will have a contraction of -4.5 percent. 

The pandemic has undone Trump's internal arguments of economic strength and full employment, although in his international diatribe he does not renounce to make China the axis of his animosity and even less so after the Asian economy could recover above 8% in 2021; nor does he leave North Korea, Iran or Russia out of his scale of geostrategic priorities.

The American Union intends to curb China's power and, to that end, seeks to refloat its relations with the United States' traditional allies, which, by the way, were quite badly treated since Trump arrived at the White House. 

Something that, in the opinion of Mike Pompeo, the US Secretary of State, is not a stumbling block but rather a "new opportunity" to bring positions closer to Europe in order to fight against "totalitarianisms" that prevail in the 21st century. 

According to the American position put forward at the last Copenhagen Democracy Summit 2020 (June 18-19), the United States and the European Union (EU) must fundamentally converge by closing ranks against regimes like China's that "violate human rights" and use their multinational corporations "to extend their political and ideological interests" beyond their borders. 

During his virtual participation in the Summit, Pompeo used all the official White House shrapnel in China's defense and accused the Chinese Communist Party of being a machine of "adverse propaganda to confuse the West" with "ideological and cybernetic" attacks full of tortious disclosures with the pretense of instilling fear and confusion. 

"This is the moment when Europe and the United States must unite.  I know that there’s fear in Europe that the United States wants you to choose between us and China. But that’s simply not the case.  It’s the Chinese Communist Party’s that’s forcing this choice.  The choice isn’t between the United States; it’s between freedom and tyranny." Pompeo said.  

In his telematic speech entitled "Europe and the challenge of China", the Trump strongman told his European counterparts that they cannot continue to open the doors to Chinese companies because the risk they run is too high, especially since they represent the interests of their own government. He reminded that Chinese capital owns priority infrastructure, from the port of Piraeus in Greece to Valencia in Spain. 

Pompeo insisted that this is not a forced choice for the EU, between China and the United States, and noted the latest accusations by the U.S. president towards China as guilty of the coronavirus, the pandemic and of "misinforming" the WHO with "unrealistic and inaccurate" data about the virus. 

Pompeo's calcareous speech, straight to the Chinese Communist Party's jugular, consisted of a series of remarks and accusations; for example, that of putting "weeds" between the United States and the EU to provoke a fracture in their relations. 

The American politician said that China carries out a series of constant violations of human rights against people in Tibet, in Hong Kong, in Taiwan; against Africans living in China abandoned to their fate during the pandemic and with the persecution of the Uyghur Muslim community in their territory. "The United States and Europe believe in democracy.  Democracy is the only system of government that honors human dignity and personal freedom and progress for mankind" Pompeo said.

Once again, the Old Continent has become a coveted ball of contention between the strategic interests of the hegemonic powers that see Europe's weaknesses as a convenience.