Opinion | No legal basis for US to impose its hegemony on China over Ukraine

Name: Staff clear rubble at Ukrainian psychiatric hospital hit by ‘brutal’ missile strike
Uploaded: 2022-03-25T01:15:24.000Z
Duration: 2 min 11 s
Description: Staff clear rubble at Ukrainian psychiatric hospital hit by ‘brutal’ missile strike

Beijing is too strong to be bullied into siding with the US against Russia and will trade with whoever it wishes to, in accordance with international law

Just as the US and Nato can decide to provide military assistance to Ukraine, so any other sovereign state can do the same for Russia if it chooses to

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Cheng JingandLeon Zhang

Published: 9:15am, 25 Mar 2022Updated: 5:45pm, 25 Mar 2022

On March 18, US President Joe Biden held a video call with President Xi Jinping for nearly two hours, talking about bilateral relations and, most importantly, the Ukraine crisis. Both Biden and Xi agreed to promote peace in Ukraine but disagreed on the characterisation and causes of the crisis, as well as the next steps to be taken.

After outlining the stance of the United States and its allies against Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the readout from Washington does not hide the US desire for China to take a side.

It emphasised “the implications and consequences if China provides material support to Russia as it conducts brutal attacks against Ukrainian cities and civilians”. Apparently, the US has the power to decide what constitutes “material support”.

Biden is not the first US official to make such a suggestion. Notably, American attempts at intimidation do not target China alone as it applies to all countries outside Nato that have not sided with the US.

However, this kind of policy is no longer as effective against China as in the semicolonial period during the Qing dynasty, not simply because China now has the strength to be equal to the United States but because the US demands are unreasonable and unfounded. The US is not the UN Security Council, which has the exclusive power to pass resolutions binding on all states, even those that are not members of the United Nations.

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Staff clear rubble at Ukrainian psychiatric hospital hit by ‘brutal’ missile strike

First, while the US regards Moscow’s military actions as “unprovoked”, pointing to Nato as a collective self-defence alliance that poses no threat to Russia, that narrative fits the interests of America and its allies. It obscures the years of eastward expansion by Nato, led by the US.