What is China’s biggest security threat? The US, says a top Chinese researcher

Wang Jisi points to Xinjiang and Hong Kong as areas of American interference in Beijing’s affairs

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Wang Jisi says it’s no secret that the US is the biggest external security challenge to China. Photo: Baidu

Published: 4:01pm, 1 Nov 2024

A top Chinese academic has called the United States the greatest security threat to China, urging Beijing to widen its network of friends to safeguard national security.

Wang Jisi, founding president of the Institute of International and Strategic Studies at Peking University, said China was facing “unprecedented severe challenges in all aspects” of national security, with Washington framing Beijing as a key challenger to its global hegemony.

“Over the past decade, the relationship between China and the United States has evolved from the vague terms of ‘stakeholders’ and ‘a new type of major power relationship’ to a clearer one,” he said in an article published in the October issue of the philosophy and social science edition of the Journal of Liaoning University.

“It is no secret that the external force that poses the greatest security threat to China comes from the United States.”

Wang said Washington had interfered in Beijing’s internal affairs – including on issues involving Xinjiang and Hong Kong – in what he saw as an effort to isolate China.

On the economic front, the US government’s views of national security “exceeds its consideration of commercial interests”, he said, arguing that trade cooperation was now highly politicised.