The Bust-Up; a Wolf Warrior Winner; Vaccine Diplomacy

Hello, and welcome to China Influence Monitor, a weekly newsletter published by CEPA and Coda Story and edited by me, Edward Lucas. We track the westward footprint of China’s influence operations, and their effects on politics, economies, societies, and alliances across Central Asia, the Caucasus, Russia, and Europe.

In this issue: meltdown in Paris; spies caught, hacks exposed; no-shows at a Beijing show-trial

Geopolitical kick-boxing 

Ding dong, seconds out. Welcome to the biggest east-west diplomatic spat in years. No knock-out blows so far but lots of bruises. The story this week:

Round One: Well-coordinated, unprecedented sanctions from the EU, US, Canada, and UK against officials responsible for abuses of Uyghurs’ human rights. An impressive example of Western resolve — and unthinkable only a year ago.

Round Two: Amid lots of performative outrage (though not much surprise) ambassadors in Beijing are summoned for rebukes. China blacklists 10 individuals (five MEPs, three national lawmakers, and two think-tankers) plus two EU committees, the Denmark-based Alliance of Democracies Foundation, and Germany’s Mercator Institute for China Studies.

They “severely harm China’s sovereignty and interests and maliciously spread lies and disinformation,” the foreign ministry complained, while Global Times published this splenetic-but-flimsy charge sheet.

Round three: European foreign ministries respond by hauling in Chinese ambassadors. As well as the usual suspects (hawkish Sweden and Lithuania) they included Italy (once the most China-friendly big country in Europe), and ever-cautious Germany, which complained of “inappropriate escalation”. Hot-foot from the bust-up in Alaska, Antony Blinken, the US secretary of state, flew to Brussels to back both the EU and a newly China-focused NATO.

More was to come. China’s embassy in Paris tweeted that ambassador Lu Shaye couldn’t come to the ministry for “scheduling reasons”. The envoy had already kicked off with vituperative tweets urging French lawmakers not to visit Taiwan, and calling a researcher, Antoine Bondaz, a “little thug”, and a “crazed hyena” for defending them.

Tempers frayed further. “Neither France nor Europe is a doormat,” fumed Europe minister Clément Beaune. When Lu did turn up, a day late, the ministry’s Asia director, Bertrand Lortholary, told him that the embassy’s methods and public comments were “completely unacceptable.”

Winner: Ambassador Lu Shaye storms off with this week’s Wolf Warrior Prize for counterproductive diplomacy.

Five consequences: 

1. Europeans no longer need to choose between China and the US: Beijing’s making the choice for them. The bullying fuels European support for the Biden administration’s global coalition.
2. Ratification of the EU-China investment deal is now in big trouble: in the European Parliament and at the national level (not least in France).
3. The Western pushback is energizing Chinese-Russian ties. Russia is likely to invite China to take part in this year’s biennial Zapad-21 military exercises in Belarus — which rehearse attacks on NATO.
4. China will continue to stoke divisions in Europe. Hungary’s foreign minister Péter Szijjártó slammed the EU sanctions as “pointless, self-aggrandizing and harmful”. China’s defense minister Wei Fenghe just visited Budapest. His next stops: Serbia, Greece, and North Macedonia.
5. With nothing to lose, some of those on the sanctions list hint that a trip to Taiwan is tempting. That will enrage the mainland authorities.

A snapshot of the shifting diplomatic spectrum: Canada says 28 diplomats from 26 Beijing embassies (including most European ones) tried to attend the show-trial of the detained Michael Kovrig. We’ve asked Bulgaria, Greece, Hungary, Slovakia, and Poland about their no-show.