Climate envoy John Kerry is being blasted for his recent attempts to cooperate with China on climate change. The Biden Administration has continued to talk about their attempts to “look righteous and reasonable through the lens of climate cooperation” but repairing relationships with China without ever getting accountable about the COVID-19 virus is just plain wicked.
Kerry met in Shanghai with his Chinese counterpart, Xie Zhenhua, over the course of three days to discuss global warming. He said they stayed focused on climate change and did not touch increasingly hot-topic issues such as China’s political crackdown in Hong Kong and its threats towards Taiwan. Kerry has even put aside the human rights abuse that amounted to genocide against Uyghur Muslims.
The Global Times called it “quite absurd” for the Biden Administration to think they can cooperate on climate issues after China refused a wide-scale crackdown on the Wuhan Lab leak theory. The U.S is now trying to put on a friendly face over climate issues and invite China to cooperate as if nothing ever happened.
“It’s very important for us to try to keep those other things away because climate is a life-or-death issue in so many different parts of the world. What we need to do is prove we can actually get together, sit down and work on some things constructively,” Kerry said.
Kerry has continued to tell reporters that China’s coal power spree could “undo” global progress on climate change and that it was clear that the addition of more coal plants has presented significant challenges to the climate crisis. China is currently the world’s largest carbon emitter, followed by the United States.
Kerry has been pushing for Beijing to speed up its timeline for reducing emission, but China’s Foreign Minister Wang Yi has demanded that Washington first address its “two lists.” The lists are an account of grievances that included sanctions on Chinese officials and U.S extradition efforts against Huawei executive Meng Wanzhou.
China has also demanded for the U.S to lift sanctions on solar panel makers. Back in June, the Biden Administration included a measure that barred Americans from purchasing products made by Hoshine Silicon Industry, as well as other restrictions on the export of U.S goods to three other Chinese companies. While Kerry says they “stayed focused” on the topic of climate change, China still hasn’t agreed to speed up its timeline for reducing emissions.
Since the Biden Administration took over, China has been using our own talking points against us. One official brought up the remark made by UN Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield (and even the president himself) that the United States is supposedly a racist country.
Senior Chinese officials have even warned Kerry that the U.S support for human rights could threaten the “climate change cooperation” that Biden has pledged. Kerry said he would pass on the “full nature of the message” he received from Chinese leaders.
The South China Morning Post even mocked Kerry, adding that China “already has its own plan and road map for achieving its climate goals.” But if Biden wants to fulfill his ‘climate change’ pledge, he’ll have to ignore the systematic abuses in China that go beyond forced labor. From sexual violence and large-scale forced detentions, China continues to commit genocide and humanity crimes against its people. But the Biden Administration will turn a blind eye to all of that in the name of ‘climate change.’
