Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Wang Wenbin Photo: fmprc.gov.cn

The Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs on Monday blasted a statement from the US and five of its allies about "trade-related economic coercion and non-market-oriented policies and practices," saying the statement looks more like describing the US. 

"The statement is made by the US together with its Five Eyes allies and Japan, but every sentence in it reads like a description of the US itself," Wang Wenbin, a spokesperson for the ministry, said at a regular press briefing on Monday, when asked about statement. 

On June 9, the US, the UK, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and Japan jointly released a statement, emphasizing their concern that trade-related economic coercion and non-market-oriented policies and practices threaten the multilateral trading system and harm relations between countries. They also expressed concern about pervasive subsidization, anti-competitive practices by state-owned enterprises, forced technology transfer, and government interference with corporate decision-making.

While the statement did not name any country, but foreign media reports have suggested that it was aimed at China. Also, US officials have recently hyped "China's economic coercion."

Commenting on the statement on Monday, Wang did not mince words. "As the US attempts to project its deplorable image onto others, the world gets a chance to see clearly what the US really is - a country that tramples on market economy principles and international trade rules," he said, "We suggest the UK and the other countries use this statement as a checklist and call on the US to correct its economic coercion, unilateral sanctions, long-arm jurisdiction, and other non-market practices."   

The US CHIPS and Science Act prohibits companies that receive federal funding from expanding advanced semiconductor production capacity in China for a decade. It also cajoles and coerces US allies into restricting export of semiconductors to China, according to Wang. 

The US has also overstretched the concept of national security and abused state power to suppress companies like Huawei and TikTok, and for many years running, the US has been the only one impeding the appointment of new judges to the WTO's Appellate Body, thus paralyzing the dispute settlement mechanism, Wang noted. 

As to forced labor, it is a persistent problem in the US as old as the country itself. Even today, more than 500,000 people in the US still live under the yoke of modern slavery and forced labor, the spokesperson said.

Global Times