INSUBCONTINENT EXCLUSIVE:
BOAO, China — President Xi Jinping on Tuesday portrayed China as committed to opening its economy as he presented an alternative vision to
President Donald Trump’s calls for tariffs and restricting trade with China, urging “dialogue rather than confrontation.”
Speaking
publicly for the first time since the beginning of an escalating trade dispute between his country and the United States, Xi implicitly took
aim at the Trump administration.
“The Cold War mentality and zero-sum game are increasingly obsolete,” Xi said
“Only by adhering to peaceful development and working together can we truly achieve win-win results.”
Xi also pledged to rebuff efforts
to impose barriers to world trade, saying that “China’s door of opening up will not be closed and will only open up even wider.”
Xi
highlighted areas where China was willing to give, including pledging to ease restrictions on imported cars by the end of the year as well
as repeating open-ended promises to give foreigners greater access to the country’s financial markets — promises officials have made in
He also pledged to strengthen intellectual property rights, addressing one of Trump’s main complaints.
His comments struck a tonal
contrast with the more combative language coming from Trump and his administration.
“We should respect each other’s core interest and
major concerns and follow a new approach to state-to-state relations, featuring dialogue rather than confrontation,” he said
“We live in a time with an overwhelming trend toward openness and connectivity.”
The speech, delivered at the Boao Forum for Asia in
China’s southern island province of Hainan, was the latest effort by China to position itself as an advocate of free trade and reliable
That pitch runs counter to long-standing accusations that China violates trade rules and intellectual property rights
It also comes as Xi tightens his grip over his country’s political, social and economic life.
Indeed, some were skeptical that China would
follow through on its pledges of openness.
“People will say about the Boao speech: ‘Show me.’ We heard this in Davos last year,”
Joerg Wuttke, former president of the European Chamber of Commerce in Beijing, said in referring to Xi’s 2017 speech at the World Economic
Forum.
But in a time when the United States’ policies have threatened to upset the stability of the world order, China’s growing
confidence and its verbal support of global trade rules offers other countries a potentially appealing alternative to Trump’s
rhetoric.
Xi’s speech came just days after the U.S
and China exchanged tit-for-tat tariff threats that have ignited worries of a global trade war
Trump administration officials have accused China of forcing foreign companies doing business there to give up trade secrets as part of
Beijing’s effort to retool the Chinese economy and create companies that can compete with U.S
rivals.
On trade, China has tried to project a balanced tone
It retaliated quickly last week after the U.S
detailed proposed tariffs it wanted to levy on about $50 billion in Chinese-made goods, saying it would match Washington’s efforts dollar
At the same time, Chinese officials have said they want to avoid a trade war and negotiate.
On Tuesday, Xi appeared to have given Trump a
concession by pledging to “significantly” lower tariffs on imported automobiles by the end of the year
Just hours before, Trump had taken to Twitter to complain about China’s 25 percent tax on imported automobiles.
But Xi’s pledges to open
China’s banking, auto and manufacturing sectors are not entirely new
Last November, China said it would ease and eventually remove limits on foreign ownership of banks and other financial firms, but financial
firms have not received details about when and how that will happen.
Even as trade disputes cast a shadow over the world’s two biggest
economies, Chinese officials see the increasingly strident tone from Washington as an opportunity
Since Trump was elected in 2016 and pursued an America First policy that has alienated some allies, Xi and other Chinese leaders have tried
to fill the void left by America’s declining presence on the world stage.
Xi traveled to Davos for the first time last year to call for
global leadership on climate on the eve of the inauguration of Trump, who has publicly questioned the science behind climate change
Chinese officials were also front and center at the most recent Davos gathering, in January, where they cited China’s progress and called
for more international cooperation on several fronts.
That call for unity could also help calm some uneasiness resulting from Xi’s recent
Last month, China formally ended term limits for its top leader, which could make Xi the country’s chief for life
That move has caused jitters among some in the United States and other countries.
At Boao, Chinese officials have promoted Xi’s leadership
as providing an opening to carry out ambitious plans to overhaul the country’s economy and make it more open.
On trade, government leaders
and Chinese corporate chiefs have sought to strike a delicate balance: playing down worries about the effect on China of a protracted trade
fight, while warning that the global economic system could be disrupted by a trade war and that the U.S
risks falling behind.
“If a trade conflict becomes a trade war, the U.S
is more likely to be hurt worse by this than China,” Dai Xianglong, a former governor of the People’s Bank of China, said on Monday at
the opening of the forum.
Other countries could be hit as well, said Fan Gang, director of China’s National Economic Research Institute
China is just a piece of a complicated regional supply chain across Asia, he said, citing the example of the Apple iPhone
Any retaliation from the United States would have a ripple effect from South Korea to Malaysia, Japan and Taiwan.
“There is definitely a
big uncertainty with this trade conflict
We started with trade friction and now conflict and possibly a war,” Fan said
“This trade war has an impact on the whole supply chain, and this is the systematic risk for China right now,” he added.
Many Chinese
business executives tried to strike a similar balance in their remarks at Boao
But some warned that the technological focus of Trump’s proposed tariffs could further split the U.S
and Chinese technology worlds — and, ultimately, stifle innovation.
“International standards come from Germany, America and Japan,”
said Dong Mingzhu, the chairwoman of Gree Electric Appliances, a leading Chinese manufacturer
“We in China don’t have any — but I believe we will have international standards.”
But not everyone has been as diplomatic
On Monday evening Jack Ma, the billionaire founder of Alibaba, warned that his pledge to create 1 million jobs in the United States could be
threatened by a trade dispute between China and the United States.
“If China and the U.S
have good relations, we could create not just a million, but 10 million jobs.”
But, he added, “If they don’t have good relations,
we’re going to destroy 10 million jobs.”
