Chapter 3 Towards International Isolation and Conflict (1)

While the Xi Jinping regime is totalitarian and authoritarian internally, it is practicing ideological diplomacy internationally. At the 19th National Congress, Xi Jinping claimed that China wanted to move closer to the center of the world stage. His claim of a community of human destiny, the “Belt and Road” strategy and the World Conference of Political Parties demonstrate his desire to become a world leader. However, with the global spread of the coronavirus pandemic, the Xinjiang Uighur genocide, the abolition of “one country, two systems” in Hong Kong, and the blatant challenge to the existing international order, China’s relationship with the world has become increasingly strained and thus China has been plunged into isolation and conflict.
  
1. Conflict in the South China Sea
 
Since the end of 2013, China has been carrying out large-scale land reclamation projects in the South China Sea. At present, China has carried out expansion works on at least seven islands including Meiji Reef and Yongxia Reef and at least three islands have got paved airstrips.
 
China’s military deployment and sovereignty claims on the islands in the South China Sea has posed a major challenge to the navigational safety and core interests of the West and neighboring countries and have created a serious geopolitical threat. According to the World Maritime Council, 25 percent of global maritime shipping goes through the Malacca Strait and the South China Sea to all the continents. In fact, China’s 60 percent of the foreign trade traffic, more than 85 percent of Japan and South Korea’s oil and 90 percent of U.S. trade in Western Pacific raw materials have to pass through the region.

In early 2012, the Philippines filed an arbitration case with the Permanent Court of Arbitration (PCA) on the grounds that China’s maritime rights and interests in the disputed waters of the South China Sea based on the nine-dashed line and its recent maritime law enforcement and island development activities had violated the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS). On July 12, 2016, in the absence of China, the five arbitrators of the tribunal unanimously ruled that China did not have historical rights to natural resources in the South China Sea based on the nine-dashed line under UNCLOS. The tribunal also found that China’s land reclamation in the South China Sea “has caused irreparable damage to the environment” and demanded that the Chinese government must stop its “activities” in the South China Sea.
 
On July 23, 2020, the Australian government submitted a statement to the United Nations expressing its opposition to any Chinese sovereignty claims that were in conflict with the 1982 UN Convention on the Law of the Sea, particularly maritime claims that didn’t not comply with the Convention’s baseline, maritime zone and character classification provisions. Australia’s statement rejected the historical basis for China’s sovereignty over the South China Sea, saying it was inconsistent with international conventions on the law of the sea and was “invalid” under the 2016 South China Sea arbitration case. Both the Trump and Biden administrations have clearly not recognized China’s sovereignty claims in the South China Sea.

2. “One Belt, One Road” Strategy
 
“The Belt and Road, a transnational economic belt was initiated and led by Xi Jinping in 2013 to cover countries in mainland China, Central Asia, North and West Asia, the Indian Ocean coast, the Mediterranean coast, South America, and the Atlantic Ocean region along China’s historic Silk Road and Maritime Silk Road.
 
China’s “Belt and Road” strategy, although far beyond China’s economic power and is fraught with investment risks, is an important step in Xi Jinping’s quest for world domination through economic cooptation and control of underdeveloped and developing countries. “The money diplomacy and debt trap brought about by the Belt and Road strategy have caused the United States and other Western countries to be highly alert and resistant to it.”