China uses economic retribution to control other countries

My article China uses economic retribution to control other countries appeared in NitiCentral.com.

Here is the link...

Everyone knows that China is an irritable country. And if you irritate China there is a price to pay.
This was openly asserted on a blog published recently by The People's Daily.
Chinascope, the website which translated the posting into English, explains: "The People's Republic of China often chooses economic retribution as a means to control other countries' actions.”
Let us not forget that The People's Daily is the mouthpiece of the Communist Party and every word published in its columns has the sanction of the authorities in Beijing.
This particular posting shows the Chinese regime's way of behaving with ‘recalcitrant’ States: “The French President came to China and took a big package, a huge present, back to France with him. When the Chinese Premier Li Keqiang went to Germany, Germany also received benefits. At the same time, the United Kingdom is just able to watch from the sidelines.”
Explanation: in September of 2007, German Chancellor Angela Merkel met the Dalai Lama, Beijing was then forced to ‘retaliate’: “Of course, China would get angry,” says the blogger.
To punish the ‘culprit’ Angela Merkel, China “got close to the British and the French” and as a result the Germans were alienated; they “had a tough time”.
But, says The People’s Daily: ‘Merkel learned her lesson’ and after her reelection, she did not dare to meet with the Dalai Lama again. “Since then, she has managed to maintain a fairly good relationship with China,” comments the blog.
Then the French: in December of 2008, President Nicolas Sarkozy met with the Tibetan leader. It set a precedent for France (though the meeting was discreetly arranged in Warsaw, Poland, to not anger the Chinese), affirms the blogger who adds that during this period, Sarkozy had a ‘double identity’ (France held the Presidency of the European Union for 6 months). So, it doubly angered Beijing. And obviously, as the blogger explains: “Coupled with the bad role Sarkozy played before the Beijing Olympics, China’s revenge against France was much more violent”.
Remember, Carrefour shops were burned. Beijing had to “give (sic) sweetness to the British and the Germans and let France suffer”.
Sarkozy did not have to be punished for long, he flatly apologized to President Hu Jintao (‘France was forced to give in and issued a joint declaration with China’). But Beijing still remembered ‘the affront’.
Though Sarkozy repeatedly ‘tried to appease China’, it took some time for Beijing to show its magnanimity; by the time China was ready to forgive the ‘hyper-president’, he had lost the presidential elections. His successor got it straight right away. Hollande’s Sherpa, Jean-Paul Ortiz, is a known ‘China expert’, he must have explained to the French President, no more “T’ word, no more encounters with the Dalai Lama.
That is how Hollande got ‘a huge gift’ with Beijing (purchase of Airbus).
Foolishly, British Prime Minister David Cameron did not read the message on the wall. In May of 2012, he received the Dalai Lama at 10, Downing Street.
The blogger of The People’s Daily comments: “This time it was Britain’s turn to suffer. Meanwhile, France and Germany got the sweet treatment from China.”
Though other British leaders had met the Dalai Lama before (I remember in the 1990’s seeing John Major’s photo on altars in monasteries in Tibet), but Cameron did not realize that the times have changed. Today China is a powerful, very powerful nation.
His punishment: “Cameron still cannot make the trip to visit China that he has always wanted to make”.
And there is a collateral, Britain will lose billions of pounds of China’s investment because its Prime Minister’s audacious gesture.
The blogger asks: “Should he refuse to admit his mistake and save face or should he get the all-important money? This really is a question for the British.” Right, London should decide if it wants Beijing’s friendship or not.
The inheritors of the British Empire should know that “in the front of today's God of Wealth–China”, one has to bow. No bowing, no business. They have to make ‘some kind of gesture to obtain China’s forgiveness’, says the blogger.
Interestingly, when the EU decided to slam duties for 'dumped' Chinese solar panels, Li Keqiang managed to convince Angela Merkel and François Hollande to object to Brussels decision. They announced that they don’t agree with Brussels’ decision. Berlin and Paris have learned the ‘correct’ way to deal with the Middle Kingdom.
But as the European Commission is insistent on charging duties on what it considers as unfair practices (the solar panels are subsidized by the Chinese State to capture the European market), Beijing preemptively retaliated, it launched an anti-dumping and anti-subsidy probe in European (read French) wines.
That’s not all. The Chinese authorities announced that they had destroyed an unspecified amount of Belgium chocolates because they contained toxic substances. Belgium media was rife with speculations: “Could it be a coincidence that the latest trashing of the national delicacy comes as the EU pursues import tariffs on Chinese solar panels.”
China is said to have identified disunity between the EU countries, in particular Germany, France, and the UK, to be the most effective way to impose what they call ‘economically divisive tools’.
When the United States were irritated with the PLA’s Black Visitors regularly hacking into the US defence computers, the US President planned (without informing Beijing that the issue was the first on the agenda) to tell his Chinese counterpart what he thought about stealing others’ properties.
The Chinese got deeply irritated to be pointed a finger.
As Obama and Xi were to going to seat on a redwood bench at Sunnylands, ‘whistleblower’ Edward Snowden suddenly emerged in Hong Kong, the Special Administrative Region of China. Was it a miracle or just a coincidence? Or perhaps a retaliation?
An interesting question: what would happen if China irritates India?
Take the example of the Chinese camping in the desolate Depsang Plains of Ladakh; it was really irritating. But don’t ask silly questions!
Delhi can’t demand a gesture from China to obtain India’s 'forgiveness'?
India automatically forgives and forgets, it is her way of doing things these days.

He is Normal, situation isn't

One more article on the French elections and President Hollande, He is Normal, situation isn't appeared today in the Edit Page of The Pioneer.
Francois Hollande takes over as France's President at a critical time. The economy is low and people's expectations from him are high. He has to manage both.
Click here to read...

Not just France, Future of Europe too is at stake

One more article on Francois Hollande' elections.
It appeared in DNA in Mumbai.

Soon after the election of François Hollande as the President of the French Republic, many Indian friends asked me: “What will happen to Carla?” I frankly don’t know and it is irrelevant. More instructive is something which happened on Sunday night as the results were announced on French TV. In the studios of the main public channel, three senior members of the Socialist Party and 3 representatives of the UMP (Union for a Popular Movement) were present, waiting for the countdown.
When the digital clock showed 8:00:00 pm, the results appeared on the screens of tens of millions of French viewers: with nearly 52% of the votes, Hollande defeated Nicolas Sarkozy, the ‘hyper’ outgoing President.
Joy exploded on the Place de la Bastille, where the Hollande’s supporters had gathered in thousands, while gloom descended on La Mutualité, where the UMP had organized a political rally for Sarkozy.
What was striking was that the first person to comment on Hollande’s victory was his former companion, Ségolène Royale, the loser of the 2007 presidential battle against Nicolas Sarkozy. Hollande and Royale, who lived together for 25 years, have 4 children. They met while studying at the ENA (Ecole Normale d’Administration), the most select school in France producing the top bureaucrats, diplomats and CEOs. As the charismatic Ségolène beamed while congratulating her former companion, I thought: “Poor lady!”
Five years ago, she was tipped to be the first woman President of France; around that time, she separated from Hollande and five years hence, it is Hollande who is elected to the post she had dreamed of.
It was like a Greek tragedy: she smiled and warmly congratulated Hollande (who has since another companion). We would say here in India, what Karma!
It shows one thing: Hollande had been able to rally all foes and friends around him to defeat the flamboyant Sarkozy.
It is probably during his tenure as Socialist Party’s First Secretary that Hollande learned the trick of being a man of consensus; there, he had no choice, with all the different factions and ‘currents’ trying to express their divergent views, often threatening to pull apart the Party.
It is these qualities that he will require to govern France, par excellence an ungovernable country; and this since the time of the Gaullish tribes.
One serious issue that the new President will have to face in the coming weeks is the state of Europe.
The ‘Merkozy’ couple played an important role in shaping a policy of ‘austerity’, but the tide seems to be turning. One of the main divergences between Hollande and Sarkozy during the campaign was Paris’ position vis-vis Berlin. Sarkozy must have felt the wind: after all, the German Model might not save Europe.
At the end of his campaign, during a large meeting on the Concorde Square in Paris, Sarkozy attacked the European Central Bank (ECB) asserting that the ECB should do more to revive European economic growth: “On the question of the ECB’s role in boosting growth, we French are going to open the debate.” He affirmed that there should be ‘no taboos’ in discussing the rules of the Eurozone, including a more growth-oriented role for the ECB. It was a U-turn on the President’s declared policy.
There were reasons for this: Francois Hollande was addressing another rally of sympathizers from the large esplanade of the Chateau de Vincennes, the royal castle in Paris, which was razed during the French Revolution. Hollande hammered that the German Model based on austerity should be abandoned. France’s relations with Germany and the European Union are now bound to change.
Though German Chancellor Angela Merkel phoned Hollande soon after the announcement of the results saying that she was ready to receive him ‘with open arms’, her spokesperson clarified that there was no question to come back on signed treaties, particularly on ‘financial discipline’. But can Europe continue the German way?
Nobel Prize laureate Paul Krugman believes that the elections in France and Greece: “were in effect referendums on the current European economic strategy, and in both countries voters turned two thumbs down.” He adds: “It’s far from clear how soon the votes will lead to changes in actual policy, but time is clearly running out for the strategy of recovery through austerity — and that’s a good thing”.
Will Hollande be able to use his consensus qualities without breaking the Franco-German couple and drop the German Model, so dear to Sarkozy?
The Socialist candidate has often repeated that when he becomes President, he would put an end to “austerity everywhere, austerity that brought desperation to people throughout Europe". One of the problems of ‘austerity’ is that it creates a depressive mood. Hollande has perhaps a chance to change the tide.
During the coming weeks, Hollande will travel to Washington at the invitation of Obama and to Berlin. His first foreign trips need to be closely followed; the future of France and Europe is at stake.