China’s assertive diplomacy has “backfired” and Beijing is now seeking a more predictable relationship with the US as the Asian country's economy slows and the government loosens its Covid-19 curbs, Washington's top Asia official said on Thursday.
Elements of China’s aggressive “wolf warrior” diplomacy have clearly been unsuccessful, said Kurt Campbell, the White House's co-ordinator for the Indo-Pacific region.
Mr Campbell said attempts to challenge Japan over islands in the East China Sea and engage in military confrontations with India in Himalayas hurt Beijing’s standing in the world.
“They’ve taken on and challenged many countries simultaneously — whether it’s, you know, Japanese waters around the Senkakus, issues associated with India’s border areas, other exploits that suggest perhaps a more ambitious China,” Mr Campbell said at the Aspen Security Forum in Washington.
“I think they recognise that that has, in many respects, backfired.”
Mr Campbell’s comments are among his most detailed since Chinese President Xi Jinping and President Joe Biden met on the sidelines of a Group of 20 summit in Bali, Indonesia, in November.
He said that Washington and Beijing wanted to stabilise ties, especially with their militaries operating in close proximity in Asia.
“As our forces rub up against one another, we want a greater degree of predictability and communication between Beijing and Washington,” Mr Campbell said.
“The last thing that the Chinese need right now is an openly hostile relationship with the United States. They want a degree of predictability and stability, and we seek that as well.”
Mr Campbell said that the coming months would see the “resumption of some of the more practical, predictable elements” of great-power diplomacy.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, who was part of the meetings in Bali, is set to head on an official diplomatic visit to China in early 2023 — a trip that was announced after Mr Xi and Mr Biden met.
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Conflict, drought, famine
Estimates of the number of deaths caused by the famine range from 400,000 to 1 million, according to a document prepared for the UK House of Lords in 2024.
It has been claimed that the policies of the Ethiopian government, which took control after deposing Emperor Haile Selassie in a military-led revolution in 1974, contributed to the scale of the famine.
Dr Miriam Bradley, senior lecturer in humanitarian studies at the University of Manchester, has argued that, by the early 1980s, “several government policies combined to cause, rather than prevent, a famine which lasted from 1983 to 1985. Mengistu’s government imposed Stalinist-model agricultural policies involving forced collectivisation and villagisation [relocation of communities into planned villages].
The West became aware of the catastrophe through a series of BBC News reports by journalist Michael Buerk in October 1984 describing a “biblical famine” and containing graphic images of thousands of people, including children, facing starvation.
Band Aid
Bob Geldof, singer with the Irish rock group The Boomtown Rats, formed Band Aid in response to the horrific images shown in the news broadcasts.
With Midge Ure of the band Ultravox, he wrote the hit charity single Do They Know it’s Christmas in December 1984, featuring a string of high-profile musicians.
Following the single’s success, the idea to stage a rock concert evolved.
Live Aid was a series of simultaneous concerts that took place at Wembley Stadium in London, John F Kennedy Stadium in Philadelphia, the US, and at various other venues across the world.
The combined event was broadcast to an estimated worldwide audience of 1.5 billion.
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When Umm Kulthum performed in Abu Dhabi
Known as The Lady of Arabic Song, Umm Kulthum performed in Abu Dhabi on November 28, 1971, as part of celebrations for the fifth anniversary of the accession of Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan as Ruler of Abu Dhabi. A concert hall was constructed for the event on land that is now Al Nahyan Stadium, behind Al Wahda Mall. The audience were treated to many of Kulthum's most well-known songs as part of the sold-out show, including Aghadan Alqak and Enta Omri.
In numbers: PKK’s money network in Europe
Germany: PKK collectors typically bring in $18 million in cash a year – amount has trebled since 2010
Revolutionary tax: Investigators say about $2 million a year raised from ‘tax collection’ around Marseille
Extortion: Gunman convicted in 2023 of demanding $10,000 from Kurdish businessman in Stockholm
Drug trade: PKK income claimed by Turkish anti-drugs force in 2024 to be as high as $500 million a year
Denmark: PKK one of two terrorist groups along with Iranian separatists ASMLA to raise “two-digit million amounts”
Contributions: Hundreds of euros expected from typical Kurdish families and thousands from business owners
TV channel: Kurdish Roj TV accounts frozen and went bankrupt after Denmark fined it more than $1 million over PKK links in 2013
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Most F1 world titles
7 — Michael Schumacher (1994, ’95, 2000, ’01 ’02, ’03, ’04)
7 — Lewis Hamilton (2008, ’14,’15, ’17, ’18, ’19, ’20)
5 — Juan Manuel Fangio (1951, ’54, ’55, ’56, ’57)
4 — Alain Prost (1985, ’86, ’89, ’93)
4 — Sebastian Vettel (2010, ’11, ’12, ’13)
