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While Russia burns, China accumulates [1]

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Date: 2023-04-22  

Published: 20 Apr, 2023

But she, Taylah Bland, a China expert at the Asia Society Policy Institute, said China was not seeking to replace the US in the world order. “China is not looking to replace the US entirely. I would think that China is hoping to establish itself more strongly in a multipolar world and is making strategic relations with countries it sees itself working well with and having a mutually beneficial relationship with,” she said. “Its work in beginning to increase the usage of [renminbi] in deals is a testament to this endeavour.”

Beijing has been accelerating internationalisation of the Chinese currency to boost its resilience in the international monetary system and provide an alternative to the US dollar as it increases trade with the world. Brazil and China also struck a deal recently to use their own currencies for future trade ahead of Brazilian President Lula’s visit to China last week. Last month, the Export-Import Bank of China offered its first yuan loan to Saudi Arabia, while France became the first Western country to settle a liquefied natural gas deal with China in the currency. China pledged to step up development aid and ramped up its efforts to promote the use of the Chinese yuan in energy markets as Chinese President Xi Jinping wrapped up his trip to Saudi Ar9abia. (10 Dec, 2022)

China has masterfully framed narratives around it’s post Covid reopening, the recent Communist Party of China (CPC) meeting, and the war in Ukraine to message it’s domestic, friendly nations and international competitors on the single subject of its initiative to dedollarize world markets.

Xi used the unexpected end of zero Covid in December 2023 to appease and motivate his domestic audience. The CPC meeting published a closing document touting new initiatives to promote deeper opening of China’s domestic markets. China announced Xi’s successful mediations between Saudi Arabia and Iran later the same month. In late February 2023 Xi’s 12 point peace plan for Ukraine was published. Soon after these announcements, world leaders from across the spectrum began to announce trips to China to discuss Xi’s peace plan. It turns out these were invitations to world leaders to discuss Xi’s peace plans and sign previously negotiated trade agreements. This pattern includes Xi’s trip to Russia to discuss his 12 point peace plan.

Coverage in the Western press of Xi’s trips focused on the inadequacies of his peace plan, while Xi collected hundreds of billions of dollars of new trade agreements, most of them with local currency options. This also includes the China-Russia trade agreements recently sign by Putin and Xi on his recent trip to Russia and trade agreement with oil producing Middle Eastern countries other than Saudi Arabia and Iran.

The US media, State Department and Treasury need to step up their messaging on China’s present behavior if there is any hope of dampening China’s effectiveness. As things stand now, China is winning the Ukraine-Russia war and the US’s image abroad is being seriously eroded as China continues to frame the US as a bully, for its use of sanctions, and a warmonger, for refusing Xi’s peace plan.

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[1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2023/4/22/2165316/-While-Russia-burns-China-accumulates

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