Source Global Times
BEIJING, China: Many of the world's most pressing issues remain unresolved, yet some countries are still engaging in geopolitical confrontation with China and Russia in the G7 meetings, highlighting the G7's role in serving US geopolitical confrontation.
This year's G7 summit is being held from Thursday to Saturday in Puglia, southern Italy. According to Reuters, much focus will be on whether the G7 leaders can finally reach agreement on how to use Russian assets frozen in the West to help Ukraine. Besides the widespread attention on the Russia-Ukraine conflict, China will also be discussed. Al Jazeera, citing a government source, reported that the US is strongly pushing its Western allies to include in the final statement the group's concern over the so-called China's industrial overcapacity.
In this regard, Chinese experts told the Global Times that it is highly likely, under US leadership, that the G7 will include the so-called Chinese overcapacity issues in the final statement. Given the negative impact this would have on global trade relations, it further reflects that the G7 does not serve the healthy recovery of the global economy.
"The G7 has transformed from a multilateral mechanism that stabilized the global economy when the West dominated the global economy into a tool for the West, especially the US, to continue maintaining and consolidating its dominance in the global economic, political and security realms through various improper means," Li Haidong, a professor at the China Foreign Affairs University, told the Global Times. "It has become a geopolitical weapon serving US strategic goals.".
Lü Xiang, research fellow at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, also pointed out that the US is attempting to dominate the entire agenda of the current edition of the G7 summit, an agenda that echoes President Joe Biden's election interests in the US, such as binding Europe to the Ukraine issue and limiting China's production capacity to win local votes. "Therefore, this G7 summit can even be seen as an expanded summit of the US National Security Council," said Lü.
G7's choice of "Africa, climate change and development" as the first session of the summit seems to emphasize the serious threats that climate change poses. However, the G7's suppression of China's green industry during the summit exposes its hypocrisy. Addressing climate change cannot rely solely on meetings and slogans but ultimately depends on various alternatives to traditional energy. The summit is taking place as the EU has announced to impose additional tariffs of up to 38.1 percent on Chinese EVs after Biden quadrupled tariffs on Chinese EVs from 25 percent to 100 percent.
"In order to undermine China, the US has allied with European countries, using tariffs and other means to artificially cut off the already established advanced green industrial chain," Lü Xiang said. "This is the most significant blow to global climate change efforts to date."
Additionally, US officials expect the G7 to send "a tough new warning" to smaller Chinese banks to stop assisting Russia in evading Western sanctions, according to Reuters. "This is another strong evidence of the G7 being reduced to a tool for US geopolitical struggles," said Li Haidong. "The West stigmatizes normal economic exchanges between China and Russia, forcing countries to take sides, thereby exacerbating bloc conflicts and inciting global confrontation. This reflects the G7's narrow-mindedness and vulgarity."
Claiming to be committed to "discussing and coordinating solutions to major global issues, especially in the areas of trade, security, economics and climate change," the G7 has now become a "political clique" for suppressing other countries and engaging in bloc confrontation. Attacking China from various perspectives has become the G7's means of asserting its presence-it no longer solves problems but has become part of the problems in this era.
According to Reuters, facing the world's most pressing problems and myriad woes at home, the G7 leaders have gathered together in "downbeat mood." Being confronted with the Russia-Ukraine conflict, the Middle East issue, and their respective domestic political predicaments, the G7 leaders should use this meeting to guide the world toward greater stability and unity, thereby fostering cohesion within their own countries' economies, societies and politics, which would help solve their domestic issues.
However, if Western countries blindly follow the US in containing China and Russia, attempting to divert domestic crises by creating international crises, they will only worsen their own domestic crises and make international crises even harder to resolve. In this context, experts believe that this summit will struggle to produce significant results, is likely to yield more destructive outcomes.
"It will make the G7 more divisive, destructive and confrontational in global affairs, further highlighting its role as a tool and vassal of US' geopolitics," said Li Haidong.
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