China warned the United States on Tuesday that it must adjust its “distorted” approach toward the country or face “conflict and confrontation,” the latest escalation in tensions between Washington and Beijing.
Washington’s China policy has “entirely deviated from the rational and sound track,” Foreign Minister Qin Gang told journalists on the sidelines of an annual meeting of China’s parliament.
According to Qin, a key adviser to President Xi Jinping, the US has suppressed and contained China instead of participating in fair competition.
“The United States’ perception and views of China are seriously distorted,” he said.
“It regards China as its primary rival and the most consequential geopolitical challenge. This is like the first button in the shirt being put wrong.”
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Relations between the two countries have been strained for years due to Taiwan’s status as a self-governing democracy, trade issues, and, more recently, the Ukraine war — but they took a turn for the worse last month when the US shot down what it claimed was a Chinese spy balloon off the coast of South Carolina.
In the aftermath of the balloon incident, Secretary of State Antony Blinken postponed a planned trip to Beijing. The FBI has recovered the unmanned aircraft and its payload, which included electronics and optics, from the ocean floor.
Meanwhile, Qin slammed Washington for shooting down the balloon and restated Beijing’s official claim that its presence over the United States was an accident.
“If the United States does not hit the brakes, and continues to speed down the wrong path, no amount of guardrails can prevent derailment, which will become conflict and confrontation, and who will bear the catastrophic consequences?” Qin warned.
“Such competition is a reckless gamble, with the stakes being the fundamental interests of the two peoples and even the future of humanity.”
Qin’s bellicose comments echoed those made by Xi in a speech Monday to legislators.
“Western countries led by the United States have implemented all-round containment, blockade and suppression of China, which has brought unprecedented grave challenges to our nation’s development,” the leader was quoted as saying by the official Xinhua News Agency.
Qin, who previously served as an ambassador to Washington, defended his country’s forceful type of diplomacy known as “wolf warrior diplomacy,” which has been in effect since 2020, at a nearly two-hour news conference in which he addressed questions written in advance.
“When jackals and wolves are blocking the way, and hungry wolves are attacking us, Chinese diplomats must then dance with the wolves and protect and defend our home and country,” he said.
Addressing the war in Ukraine, Qin claimed that an “invisible hand” was pushing for the continuation and escalation of the conflict “to serve certain geopolitical agendas,” but he did not say whom he was referring to.
Dmitry Peskov, a Kremlin spokesperson, responded to Qin’s remarks by underlining Russia’s position that the US was driving the war in Ukraine, claiming that China’s foreign minister was kidding when he mentioned the “invisible hand.”
“Washington does not want this war to end,” Putin’s mouthpiece said. “Washington wants and is doing everything to continue this war. This is the visible hand.”
Qin reiterated China’s request for a cease-fire in the conflict, which is now in its second year. China released a 12-point peace proposal last month, which Moscow praised but the West disregarded.
China’s claims of neutrality in the conflict have come under fire after Beijing struck a “no-limits friendship” with Russia just weeks before it attacked Ukraine, and China has declined to condemn the invasion — or even call it that — and failed to name Russia as the aggressor.
A meeting last month in Moscow between China’s top diplomat and President Vladimir Putin fueled Western suspicions that Beijing was considering supplying Russia with weapons, something China has categorically denied.
Moscow has consistently stated that the United States and other Western countries are using Ukraine to humiliate and destroy Russia. Ukraine, according to Kyiv and its allies, is fighting for its survival and independence against an unprovoked Russian territory grab.
Qin said Tuesday, in a remark sure to please Putin, that China needed to advance its relations with Russia as the globe became more volatile.
Addressing the hot-button question of Taiwan, which China claims as part of its territory, Qin accused the US of “disrespecting China’s sovereignty and territorial integrity” by offering the island nation political support and supplying it with defensive weapons.
Beijing has threatened to use force to bring Taiwan to heel, sounding alarm bells in Washington.
“Why does the US ask China not to provide weapons to Russia, while it keeps selling arms to Taiwan?” Qin asked.
The US does not advocate for Taiwan’s formal independence from China, but it is required by law to help the island defend itself if attacked.
To avoid further antagonizing China, House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) will meet with Taiwan President Tsai Ing-wen in California next month rather than in Taipei.
The visit to Taiwan in August by then-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) enraged Beijing, causing it to hold its largest military drills in the region in a quarter-century.
