Washington :
The lack of a red carpet for the top U.S. diplomat’s arrival in China on Wednesday has been greeted with suspicion, cynicism, and theories that Beijing was sending a not-so-subtle message.
As Blinken began his three-day tour to China in Shanghai, commentators and internet users pointed out that China had not followed custom of rolling out a red carpet for a famous guest.
Posting on X, Blinken has arrived in Shanghai, China, declared Hu Xijin, a former editor-in-chief of the Chinese state newspaper Global Times. When he got out of the aircraft, a lot of people observed that the ground appeared to be devoid of red carpet. Though the United States made some difficult public opinion preparations in advance, his China visit should be viewed as ‘imploring’.
Reacting to Hu Xijin’s post, eminent senior scholar Gordon Chang of the New York-based Gatestone Institute think tank said, “#China, before #Blinken even stepped off his plane in #Shanghai today, insulted him.”
Claiming to be anti-mainstream media, an X user going by the moniker Lord Bebo wrote, “Blinken comes in China and is received WITHOUT RED CARPET. No band, nothing at all; he’s greeted like an unimportant person.” Nearly 10,000 people liked his post.
Though numerous tensions still exist, U.S.-China ties have improved since the two countries started high-level contacts.
U.S. media indicated before to Blinken’s arrival that sanctions against certain Chinese banks were being explored in order to offset their backing of Russia. In presenting the State Department’s 2023 Country Reports on Human Rights Practices, Blinken further declared that the Uyghurs in Xinjiang are victims of crimes against humanity and genocide.
He landed in China the same day that President Joe Biden signed a law requiring TikTok’s parent company, ByteDance, to sell its U.S. businesses and includes military assistance from Taiwan.
“What a strange time for Blinken to be landing in China,” noted Abishur Prakash, a geopolitical expert from Canada. “Led by the measures around TikTok, Taiwan and support nations in the Indo-Pacific against Beijing, the U.S. is full-steam ahead on taking on China.”
Diplomacy done in person counts.
Blinken released a video address on his first day in Shanghai, set against the Shanghai World Financial Center and the neon-lit Oriental Pearl Tower.
“We just arrived here in Shanghai in the People’s Republic of China to work on issues that matter to the American people,” he stated in the video. “Fentanyl, synthetic opioids, is one of those and the main cause of death for Americans between the ages of 18 and 49.
“At their meeting in San Francisco at the end of last year, Presidents Xi [Jinping] and Joe Biden committed to working together to stop fentanyl and the components that produce it from entering the US. We shall get on with that.”
Along with his Chinese government counterparts, Blinken said he will be speaking with academics, business executives, students, and “the people who are building bridges and ties between our countries.”
Naturally, we will also address the areas in which we truly disagree with China, engaging them directly and making our points very clear. Diplomacy done in person counts, he remarked. “It’s important to advance the interests of the American people, avoid miscommunications, and misperceptions.”
Response adopts an anti-American tenor.
Cynicism greeted Blinken’s appeals on Chinese social media.
The biggest social network in China, Weibo, saw little coverage of Blinken’s second visit, and the conversation was dominated by anti-American sentiment.
An individual going by Xiao Fan Hao on Weibo She contended that not all fentanyl-like drugs are formally included on the restricted list in the United States.
“We ask whether the United States believes that it may solve the domestic problems in the United States by shifting the blame externally, shirking responsibility, and smearing China’s image,” she said.
As said by a Weibo user going by An Hao Xin, “Coming with him is also the ‘bank sanctions’ negotiating tool. To be really honest, just expel SWIFT as soon as can. Why are you pondering?”
Commenter number two added, “If you dare to overturn the table, then we just aid Russia with weapons and see who suffers.”
Former executive director of Human Rights Watch and visiting Princeton University professor Kenneth Roth connected the visit to American Middle East policy, stating on X that Blinken “would have an easier time telling the Chinese government not to provide military supplies to Russia as it commits war crimes in Ukraine if the U.S. government were not arming Israel as it commits war crimes in Gaza.”
Roth did add, “It will be shameful if Blinken is so determined to make nice to Beijing that he doesn’t publicly mention its crimes against humanity targeting Uyghur Muslims in Xinjiang.”
The Wall Street Journal’s China bureau chief Jonathan Cheng stated on X, “An unidentified Chinese official told Blinken, ‘Perception is always the first button that has to be pushed right. There must not be any disastrous error on the basic question of whether China and the US are allies or adversaries.”