China shouldn’t interfere with “extraordinary” protests against strict Covid curbs that broke out across the country, the US envoy to Beijing said Tuesday in the most detailed comments about the demonstrations by a senior US official so far.
“We believe that Chinese people have a right to protest peacefully, they have a right to make their views known,” US Ambassador to China Nicholas Burns told the Chicago Council on Global Affairs. “That’s a fundamental right around the world -- it should be -- and that right should not be hindered with, and it shouldn’t be interfered with.”
It’s hard to say if the protests will have any long-term impact, Burns said, noting that it was a “very critical time” for China given a spike in Covid infections in major cities and across the country. He said the police response in some cases had been “heavy-handed,” but otherwise refrained from criticizing President Xi Jinping’s handling of the issue.
“We just have to see how this plays out,” Burns said. “It’s obviously a very important event for the people of China. And we’re watching it, of course, with great care and great attention.”
Burns’s relatively muted comments highlight the balancing act US officials have sought to maintain toward the protests, which have also seen demonstrators calling for greater political freedom -- and even in some cases for Xi to step down. One fear is that China could portray any expression of support for the protests as evidence that the US is somehow fomenting them.
China’s top body in charge of police and public security pledged late Tuesday to crack down on “hostile forces” and their “sabotage,” without being specific, and vowed that “illegal and criminal acts that disrupt social order” won’t be tolerated.
The protests rocked several Chinese cities over the weekend, with demonstrators criticizing Xi and his “Covid Zero” policy of lockdowns and mandatory quarantines. The risky show of defiance -- coming after a deadly fire in the western city of Urumqi where protesters blamed fatalities on Covid containment -- rattled authorities, who blanketed cities with a heavy police presence on Monday to quell more unrest.
The rallies occurred less than two weeks after President Joe Biden cooled tensions by meeting Xi on the sidelines of the Group of 20 meeting in Bali, Indonesia, the first meeting of the two men as leaders of the world’s two largest economies.
White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre also said earlier Tuesday that peaceful protests should be allowed to continue.
“We’ve been very clear that people have a right to peacefully protest without fear, and we don’t think that that right should be hindered or interfered with,” Jean-Pierre said.
(Bloomberg)
A protest against China's strict zero Covid measures in Beijing. (AFP)
