U.S. targets Google's online ad business monopoly in latest Big Tech lawsuit
WASHINGTON, - The U.S. Justice Department accused Alphabet Inc's (GOOGL.O) Google on Tuesday of abusing its dominance in digital advertising, threatening to dismantle a key business at the heart of one of Silicon Valley's most successful internet companies.
The government said Google should be forced to sell its ad manager suite, tackling a business that generated about 12 percent of Google's revenues in 2021, but also plays a vital role in the search engine and cloud company's overall sales.
"Google has used anticompetitive, exclusionary, and unlawful means to eliminate or severely diminish any threat to its dominance over digital advertising technologies," the antitrust complaint said.
Google, whose advertising business is responsible for about 80% of its revenue, said the government was "doubling down on a flawed argument that would slow innovation, raise advertising fees, and make it harder for thousands of small businesses and publishers to grow."
The federal government has said its Big Tech investigations and lawsuits are aimed at leveling the playing field for smaller rivals to a group of powerful companies that includes Amazon.com (AMZN.O), Facebook owner Meta Platforms (META.O) and Apple Inc (AAPL.O).
"By suing Google for monopolizing advertising technology, the DOJ today aims at the heart of the internet giant’s power," said Charlotte Slaiman, competition policy director at Public Knowledge. "The complaint lays out the many anticompetitive strategies from Google that have held our internet ecosystem back."
Tuesday's lawsuit by the administration of President Joe Biden, a Democrat, follows a 2020 antitrust lawsuit brought against Google during the term of Donald Trump, a Republican.
The 2020 lawsuit alleged violations of antitrust law in how the company acquires or maintains its dominance with its monopoly in online search and is scheduled to go to trial in September.
EIGHT STATES IN LAWSUIT
Eight states joined Tuesday's lawsuit, including Google's home state of California.
California State Attorney General Rob Bonta said that Google's practices have "stifled creativity in a space where innovation is crucial."
Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser said that Google's dominance had led to higher fees for advertisers and less money for publishers with ad space to offer. "We are taking action by filing this lawsuit to unwind Google’s monopoly and restore competition to the digital advertising business," he said in a statement.
Google shares were down 1.9 percent on Tuesday.
[1/2] A logo of Google is seen at its exhibition space, at the Viva Technology conference dedicated to innovation and startups at Porte de Versailles exhibition center in Paris, France June 15, 2022. REUTERS/Benoit Tessier
In addition to its well-known search, which is free, Google makes revenue through its interlocking ad tech businesses. The government asked for the divestiture of the Google Ad Manager suite, including Google's ad exchange, AdX.
Google Ad Manager is a suite of tools including one that allows websites to offer advertising space for sale and an exchange that serves a marketplace that automatically matches advertisers with those publishers.
Advertisers and website publishers have complained that Google has not been transparent about where ad dollars go, specifically how much goes to publishers and how much to Google.
The lawsuit raises concerns about certain products in the ad tech stack, where publishers and advertisers use Google's tools to buy and sell ad space on other websites. That business was about $31.7 billion in 2021 or 12.3 percent of Google’s total revenue. About 70% of that revenue goes to publishers.
An ad tech divestiture "may not be a game changer but it could be sneaky important to Google's ad targeting capability," said Paul Gallant with the Cowen Washington Research Group.
"It connects to all of Google's other businesses and ties them together. I think Google might be more concerned about losing ad tech down the road than people might think," Gallant said.
The company made a series of purchases, including DoubleClick in 2008 and AdMob in 2009, to help make it a dominant player in online advertising.
'PROJECT POIROT'
While Google remains the market leader by a long shot, its share of the U.S. digital ad revenue has been eroding, falling to 28.8% last year from 36.7% in 2016, according to Insider Intelligence.
The Justice Department asked for a jury to decide the case, which was filed in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia.
The lawsuit lays out a number of Google's attempts to dominate the advertising market.
The complaint discussed header bidding, which was a way that companies could bypass Google to bid on ad space on websites.
It lays out a series of projects including one dubbed "Project Poirot" named after Agatha Christie’s master detective, Hercule Poirot. The project "was designed to identify and respond effectively to ad exchanges that had adopted header bidding technology."
The 149-page complaint said Google doubled down after Project Poirot's initial success in manipulating its advertisers' spending to reduce competition from rival ad exchanges. Rivals AppNexus/Xandr lost 31% of DV360 advertiser spending, Rubicon would lose 22%, OpenX would lose 42%, and Pubmatic would lose 26%, the complaint said.
Reporting by Diane Bartz and David Shepardson; additional reporting by Sheila Dang; editing by Chris Sanders and Grant McCool
Mushrooming of medical schools due to lack of foresight, says PSM chief
PSM chief says the government must take the blame for what he called a “messy situation” that resulted from its decision 20 years ago to start licensing too many medical schools.
Niaga AWANI: Wakeup Call | Brain drain is only a symptom
We speak to President and Chief Executive Officer (CEO) EMIR Research, Dr Rais Hussin on brain drain phenomenon.
/i
Brain Drain - Malaysia
Cause for concern: Dr Noor Hisham said the migration of health professionals was fuelled by many reasons, including economic factors. — LOW BOON TAT/The Star
Migration of health professionals was fuelled by many reasons, including economic factors.
PHOTO: THE STAR/ASIA NEWS NETWORK
PETALING JAYA - Malaysia’s healthcare sector is not the only one facing a brain drain as other skilled sectors are facing the same problem, top officials say, as they responded to comments by a leading academic that the country’s top university loses at least 30 of its best medical graduates to Singapore every year.
New Health Minister Zaliha Mustafa said the brain drain is definitely a loss, but insisted that the right skills be inculcated to ensure that Malaysians continue to receive the highest quality services.
She said she was aware of the recommendations of the Human Resources for Health Strategy of her predecessors, including on the recruitment of doctors, improving the quality of training with clearer career pathways and improving their working conditions.
Health director-general Noor Hisham Abdullah said on Friday: “The issue of brain drain cuts across the workforce. It’s across all specialities, not only in the medical field.”
On complaints by medical students of poor working conditions, bullying, low wages, as well as inadequate training and career opportunities, he said there was no guarantee that migration would stop even if these issues ceased.
He said the migration of health professionals was fuelled by many reasons, including economic factors.
“Singapore’s currency is three times better than ours. Many Johoreans cross over to work in Singapore, so can the same argument be used?
“Even Singapore’s healthcare system has a similar issue with its citizens migrating elsewhere like to Australia,” he added.
The issue of brain loss was raised on Thursday by Professor Adeeba Kamarulzaman, who said the top college, Universiti Malaya, loses at least 30 of its best and brightest medical graduates to Singapore every year.
The professor of medicine and infectious diseases at Universiti Malaya’s medical faculty said in a tweet on Thursday that the brain drain will continue if nothing is done to address issues such as a lack of clear training and career pathways for doctors, nurses and allied health professionals
A male nurse working in Singapore told The Star that working in the Republic provided him the opportunity to gain wider experience.
“Singapore practises international standards and if I want to find jobs in Australia, New Zealand or even the United Kingdom, it will be easy for me,” he said, adding that nurses in Singapore undergo procedure competency courses frequently.
Malaysian Medical Association president Muruga Raj Rajathurai said the government needed to take steps to provide better career prospects in terms of career advancement and remuneration.
“Better pay is among the main reasons the junior doctors are leaving to work abroad. It doesn’t help that the cost of living has gone up in the country.
“Issues such as the contract system, permanent positions and even burnout need to be resolved or doctors will lose hope in the system and leave for greener pastures,” he said on Friday.
National Association of Human Resources Malaysia president Zarina Ismail, who runs a recruitment agency, said her firm found employment for qualified Malaysians such as nurses, doctors, lecturers and oil and gas professionals to work overseas.
“Many of the nurses say they don’t make enough here to have any savings at the end of the month.
“That is why they choose to look for jobs in countries like Saudi Arabia and other Middle Eastern countries, where they can earn RM12,000 (S$3,700) monthly,” she said. THE STAR/ASIA NEWS NETWORK
The US had not taken South Korea's interests into consideration from the very beginning. Such arrogance and indifference are undoubtedly an insult to South Korea's self-esteem.
The Biden administration has moved to further restrict China's access to advanced semiconductor products and technology, placing seven more Chinese entities of aerospace on its export control list late August, ...
The Chinese-language website of Deutsche Welle on Tuesday published a commentary entitled "Maintaining critical dialogue with China is more important than ever." The article is filled with clichés about so-called "human rights issues in Xinjiang," which are not worth reading. But the phrase "critical dialogue" in the headline is intriguing. It is in fact the main attitude of the US and other Western countries in communicating with non-Western nations in recent years.
This is, in most cases, an unconscious revelation of American and Western elites' inner feeling of superiority. But now they put it forward consciously and promote it as an "effective way" to deal with China. This cannot be explained simply by "pride and prejudice." They did not articulate it in the past, but Western countries have been practicing and enhancing the so-called critical dialogue with China. It has become an approach or even a weapon in the West's strategic game with China. In other words, they are trying to "lecture" China under the cover of "dialogue."
In global interactions, disagreements are common. It is also normal to express different views or even criticize without mincing words. However, equal dialogue cannot be based on the premise that some values are superior to others. It also cannot be only one party lecturing or accusing the other. The US and the West's "critical dialogue" is condescending, and the implied logic is that only they have the ability, qualification and power to determine right and wrong. This means that one party already claimed the moral high ground before the "dialogue" even begins, which dwarfs the development level and moral image of other countries.
Colonialism has long been discarded as something despicable, but Western-centric power structures and mentality have not disappeared completely. Colonialism has been subtly transplanted into various aspects, lurking in Western political language and communication methods. Some elites in the US and the West, with a strong sense of superiority on civilization, regard non-Western countries as candidates waiting for their "approval." With ideological pointers in their hands, they took to the podium to oversee exams, judge papers, and then grade them based on the "performance" of these countries to determine whether they passed the exam. As for the standard of scoring, it is drawn by the US and the West according to their own historical and social formations, and "Western-centrism" is the only correct answer in all the exams.
In their eyes, only the West is right, civilized and advanced, while those who differ from them are branded as "evil," barbaric and backward. They forcibly create a dichotomy between "civilization" and "barbarism." On this fictional premise, they attach moral labels on different practices of other countries, trying to dwarf them in image so that they can "attack others from a high position" as they wish. It is for this reason they recklessly fabricate the lie of "genocide" in Xinjiang, audaciously call for "punishing China" by various means, and frantically threaten to bomb China "back into the Stone Age."
Sometimes, arrogance is a kind of overbearingness; sometimes, it is also a kind of deep inferiority. In the face of the rise of emerging market countries, including China, and their own troubles, the US and other Western countries are becoming increasingly overwhelmed. Faced with the narrowing gap between them and emerging market countries, they have to rely on slogans of "human rights" and "democracy" to maintain their "absolute advantage." The reason why they are so sensitive to their position in the dialogue is that they are aware of the disappearance of the absolute advantage they used to have. As a result, they have to deliberately highlight their discourse power to maintain the obsolete power structure behind it, which has become a subconscious reaction.
Even in the fields of human rights and democracy, the US and the West are increasingly lagging behind, relying only on slogans, posturing and fist-pumping to show their "self-esteem," which is actually laughable to the rest of the world. The West's self-confidence is collapsing, as the democratization of international relations is increasingly popular and as developing countries' awareness of their rights is strengthening. Today, if someone still wants to engage in colonialism and ideological hegemony, or even imagines leading other countries by the nose like livestock, no country with national pride and a sense of independence will obey.
Returning to the "critical dialogue," China has never been afraid of criticism, but firmly opposes hegemony. Times have changed, and US and Western elites should learn to be equal and respectful. Dialogue is necessary, and we welcome "constructive dialogue," but we reject "critical dialogue." We would also like to remind that a condescending posture is dangerous, because the farther you are from the ground, the harder you may fall.
Chinese envoy to the United Nations on Thursday sternly refuted the allegations of “genocide” made
by the US and the UK over human rights situation in China's Xinjiang region, after the two countries took a Security Council meeting on
international law and maintaining peace and security as a chance to attack China on Xinjiang-related issues. They have also called on another “investigative” trip to Xinjiang on Thursday after they found that the UN human rights chief's recent visit to Xinjiang had failed to support their “genocide” fallacies about the region.
After frequent gun shooting cases nationwide in the US
that caused heavy casualties, including children, the White House and Capitol Hill are trying to show that they are trying to find a solution
under pressure from society, as US President Joe Biden said Congress "must act to pass gun control legislation."
The US, whose flag flies over 750 military bases in more than 80 countries and regions, seems to
be sitting on pins and needles after witnessing China sign ONE security cooperation framework agreement with the Solomon Islands. On Tuesday
local time, US President Joe Biden met with New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern in the White House. Their “shared concern” about China's
security agreement and “China's Pacific ambitions” were soon placed under the spotlight of Western media outlets.
` ` MAN and nature are running out of time. That’s
the core message of the UN Inter-governmental Panel on Climate Change
...
` In short, historically it was the Church that gave the moral blessing for colonisation, slavery and genocide during the Age of Globalisation.
The tragedy is that the Doctrine of Discovery is now embodied in US laws.
One thing is clear, whilst the quantity of educated manpower is critical to national strength, quality may matter more.
Parents quarrel about the quality of education for their kids, just as societies are deeply divided on education as it defines the future.
Is the current education system fit for purpose to cope with a more complex, fractious future, fraught with possible war?
According to Stanford University’s Guide to Reimagining Higher Education, 96% of university chief academic officers think that their students are ready for the workforce, where only 11% of business leaders feel the same.
As the population and work force grow, the gap between skills demanded by employers and the education received by school leavers is widening, so much so that many are finding it hard to get the jobs that they want.
As technology accelerates in speed and complexity, the quality of education becomes more important than ever. Is it for the elites or the masses?
The Greek philosopher Aristotle recognised that the aim of education is for knowledge, but there was always a different view as to have knowledge for the individual or whether education must prepare the individual to fulfil the needs of society.
Feudal systems hardly paid attention to the masses, whereas most ancient institutes of higher learning were for elites, either for religious orders or in Chinese history, to prepare for civil or military service, but blended with self-cultivation.
Conservative think tank American Enterprise Institute (AEI) has just produced a fascinating study on the implications of higher education for national security.
Covering the period 1950-2040, the study acknowledged that the United States attained uncontested power status, because it had the highest levels of educational attainment and manpower.
In 1950, the United States, with less than 5% of the world’s population, had 45% share of world population aged 25 to 64 with completed tertiary education.In comparison, India had 5% and China about half of that.By 2020, the United States’ share had dropped to roughly 16%, whereas China was catching up, whilst India had just under 10%.By 2040, depending on different estimates, China may double its share to between 15% and 20%, whereas India would have overtaken the United States with 12%, leaving the United States third with 10%.
It is a truism that education matters for economic growth and power.Every additional year of schooling for children is estimated to add 9% to 10% increase in per capita output.
If you add in “business climate” with improvements in education, health and urbanisation, these factors explain five-sixths of differences in output per capita across countries.
Under the liberal world order, America encouraged the spread of global education, so much so that the global adult illiteracy (those without any schooling) fell from 45% in 1950 to only 13% by 2020.
This worldwide expansion in education was good for the world, but it also reduced the comparative advantage of the education and technology front-runners, particularly the United States.
The AEI study reported that the share of global adult population with at least some tertiary education increased from under 2% in 1950 to 16% today and would approach 22% by 2040.
In 1950, eight of the top 10 largest national highly educated working age labour pool was in advanced countries. By 2020, their share was half.
By 2040, this is likely to be only three out of 10.
In essence, India and China would take the lead in total highly trained manpower, especially in science and technology, with the United States “an increasingly distant third place contestant.”
The AEI study illustrates why increasingly American universities will be more selective in their future foreign student intake, especially in science and technology which may have impact on national security matters.
As late as 2017, MIT manifested global ambitions in its strategic plan, “Learning about the world, helping to solve the world’s greatest problems, and working with international collaborators who share our curiosity and commitment to rigorous scientific inquiry.”
That global vision may be cut back in light of the growing geopolitical split into military blocs. Western universities may no longer be encouraged to train foreign students into areas where they can return to compete in key technologies.
In short, geopolitical rivalry will determine the future of resources allocated to education, research and development and technology.
No country can afford liberal education in which every student is encouraged to do what he or she wants to do.
Students today want to be more engaged in the big social issues, such as climate change and social inequality.
But at the same time, they expect more experiential immersion into careers that are more self-fulfilling.
Instead, institutes of higher learning are forced by economics to provide more shorter term courses to upgrade worker skills, using new teaching methods and tools, especially artificial intelligence, virtual reality etc.
At the national level, governments will push universities into more research and development and innovation to gain national competitiveness, including R&D on defence and national security sectors.This means that the education pipeline or supply chain will also be bifurcated like global supply chains that are being disrupted and split by geopolitics.
The conversation on what should go into the curriculum for education is only just beginning. Much of this is to do with funding.
As higher levels of education are more expensive, especially in the high technology area, whilst governments budgets are constrained, universities will turn to private sources of funding.
The more society polarises, the more likely that such funding would turn towards entrenchment of vested interests, rather than solutions to structural problems.
Education is controversial precisely because it is either a unifying social force or a divisive one.
One thing is clear, whilst the quantity of educated manpower is critical to national strength, quality may matter more.
The Soviet Union had the second largest share of educated manpower during the Cold War, but it did not save it from collapse.
Will our future education system provide leaders who are able to cope with the complexities of tomorrow?
As the poet T S Eliot asked in his poem “The Rock” in 1934, “where is the wisdom we have lost in knowledge?”
That question is being asked not just in universities, but by society as a whole.
Andrew Sheng writes on global issues from an Asian perspective. The views expressed here are the writer’s own.
Tesla's founder Elon Musk inks a deal to purchase Twitter with $44 billion in cash. Photo: website
News about Elon Musk's Twitter takeover has sparked continuous heated discussions in the US recently. The focus of some, however, has apparently been off the track. A New York Times reporter tweeted to question whether Twitter would become one of the platforms Beijing will gain leverage over in the future. It was re-tweeted and commented on by Amazon founder Jeff Bezos. There are also voices saying that Musk will have to seek a balance between his support for free speech and his business activities in China, and that China will exert influence on Twitter through Musk.
Many American media outlets didn't forget to "remind" people of the fact that Musk once "praised" China, and he encouraged people to visit China and see for themselves. At a critical moment when China and the US were locked in trade frictions in 2019, Tesla's Shanghai Gigafactory kicked into production. In merely over a year, Shanghai-made Teslas have accounted for more than half of Tesla's global delivery. Musk has dealt a lot with China and spoke out some truths about China's economy, they are regarded as "original sins" of Musk by some Americans. Many link Musk's Twitter deal with China and raise it to the level of "risks" or "threats", which shows how narrow the room for pragmatism and rationality toward China in the US has become. Similar incidents have become common in the US. Making an issue of China in every possible way has already become an "American disease." In the face of China's growing comprehensive national power that is closing the gap with the US', the confidence of many political elites in Washington has been declining. And these people are showing anxiety and over-sensitivity toward China, not letting go of any opportunity to hype the "China threat" theory. After Musk acquired Twitter, some from American media even urged Musk to cut off his business ties with China to "guarantee freedom of speech." Such extreme overbearingness hilariously overlaps their weakness.
An interesting phenomenon is that many China security-related discussions contain various "private interests" if you look at them closely. Some businesspeople, such as George Soros, blamed China for their failure due to their wrong investment decisions in China. Others try to show their allegiance to the US. For example, Bezos often stresses security with a high-profile patriotic posture, but what he actually eyes are Pentagon orders that are highly profitable. More lawmakers and politicians touch on the China topic in an exaggerated and forcible way, through which they attack opponents as "weak." The "China Threat" is becoming a tacit business approach or a code to seek attention.
From the national perspective, Sinophobia which is currently rampant in American society is not fundamentally different from "Japanophobia" that prevailed in the 1980s and 1990s. In both cases, the US regards a "chaser" as competitor, on which the US tried to suppress by any means to ensure its own competitive advantage. But the end of the story will be different because there is no way that Washington can overwhelm China in the same way that it coerced Japan to sign a Plaza Accord. Chinese people do not believe in fallacies, nor are we afraid of evil forces. We will never yield to threats or coercion. As to words and deeds of forcefully making an issue of China, they remind people of an ancient poem: Along the Yangzi River, apes moan ceaselessly. My boat has passed ten thousand mounts briskly.
It must be pointed out that making an issue of China can't save the US. Instead, it will continue to intensify all the problems Washington is facing, be they domestic or external, and squeeze the room to solve these issues in the future. Even some people of insight in the US have warned that the excessive attention on undermining Beijing's advantages could make Washington neglect its most important tasks at home and push its foreign policies to deviate from its course even further. "American hubris is always a danger, but so is exaggerated fear, which can lead to overreaction," wrote US scholar Joseph Nye last year. "The US and China must avoid exaggerated fears that could create a new cold or hot war," he added. It seems that those who are sick are unwilling to take medicine.
The US is trying to oppose China in every possible aspect, reflecting the peremptory squeezing of reality by the US' anti-China ideology. But the reality is also resisting the ideological pressure at all times. The twist has distorted some US elites' mindset, making them fall into hesitation and division. However, the "China threat" is not the root cause of Washington's internal and external problems. Reality will make them understand sooner or later that win-win cooperation is the effective cure for their disease.
Harvard & Cambridge: China's Era Already? You Bet!
Danny Haiphong. Photo:Courtesy of Haiphong
Editor's Note:
For the Chinese people, the past decade was epic and inspirational. The country, under the leadership of President Xi Jinping, has made great endeavors in boosting its economy, deepening reforms, improving the rights of its people and acting as a responsible power globally.
To help understand China's progress in the past decade, the Global Times (GT) has launched a weekly series of interviews with scholars from home and abroad, presenting a holistic view of China's governance philosophy. The following is an interview with Danny Haiphong (Haiphong), an independent journalist in the US and co-editor of Friends of Socialist China as well as a founding member of the No Cold War international campaign, on how China has made human rights protection a priority and how it has taken human rights moral high grounds.
GT: The US Department of State issued the 2021 Country Reports on Human Rights Practices on April 12, of which 90 pages are used to criticize China's human rights conditions. At the same time, 2021 was considered to be the US' most fatal year in history with more than 460,000 Americans killed by the coronavirus last year. Why does the US care more about human rights of China and other countries than its own record?
Haiphong: The US has politicized human rights for several reasons, none of which have anything to do with genuine concerns about the wellbeing of people. Constant speculation about human rights elsewhere provides a distraction from the shortcomings of the US' own political and economic system. The US possesses an abhorrent human rights record. An average of three Americans per day are killed by US law enforcement. Nearly one million Americans have died of COVID-19. US wars abroad have taken the lives of millions and destabilized entire regions.
Human rights are also an integral component of US foreign policy. Any nation deemed a threat to US hegemony is condemned for human rights violations. Often, the allegations are unfounded. This is certainly the case in relation to China. The US has spread insidious lies about the so-called human rights violations in China's Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region and Hong Kong Special Administration Region (HKSAR) to justify sanctions and military encirclement. The US' politicization of human rights is not only hypocritical, but a true danger to humanity.
GT: Since the outbreak of the epidemic, China has prioritized the protection of people's lives, what kind of human rights views do you think this reflects?
Haiphong: China's approach to human rights is people-centered. People come first. China's dynamic zero-COVID strategy is a case in point. Human life is the top priority. This priority has mobilized the entire society in a successful war against COVID-19 which has kept the death toll very low.
This doesn't mean tradeoffs do not exist. The protection of human life amid a deadly pandemic means that uncertainty and hardship are inevitable. But it is the people-centered human rights approach which keeps China and its legitimate leadership, the Communist Party of China, forward on the path to becoming a modern socialist country by 2050.
GT: How do you see the influence the "coexistence with the virus" policy has had on the US and other Western countries? Western media are attacking and smearing China's zero-COVID strategy. Why do they suggest China should also "lie flat" in its fight against the epidemic?
Haiphong: The politicization of COVID-19 in the US and other Western countries has created a public opinion crisis. Not only have large numbers of people been misinformed about COVID-19, but many have been convinced that China is to blame for their disastrous conditions. The truth is that the US and its Western allies neglected their domestic and global obligations to properly address the pandemic in the interests of humanity. Now these same countries want to see China plunged into a crisis through the abandonment of its successful strategy to contain the pandemic.
The reasons for this are simple. For one, China abandoning the zero-COVID strategy would validate the endless smears that the US has leveled against it. Furthermore, the US views China's zero-COVID strategy as a threat to its hegemony. This may seem silly, but it does have a material basis to it. China's zero-COVID strategy offers hope that COVID-19 deaths and cases can be reduced without completely sacrificing economic growth. The US knows that should China abandon this path, all of its progress would be threatened. This best serves the US' narrow and selfish interests.
GT: Chinese President Xi Jinping has emphasized unswerving adherence to China's path of human rights development, saying living a happy life is the biggest human right for the people. Over the past years, many surveys conducted by Western institutions showed Chinese people's rising levels of satisfaction with the government's performance. What does this demonstrate? How do you comment on China's human rights views?
Haiphong: Widespread popular satisfaction with China's government is an indicator of legitimacy. China's socialist governance system serves the people. Human rights development is thus much broader in China than in the West. Economic freedom, or the freedom to a livelihood without poverty, hunger, homelessness and instability is a top priority.
China's socialist governance system has built a foundation of legitimacy with the people by serving their needs and giving them real reasons to believe that their lives will be better than prior generations.
China's own human rights views are driven by deep experience with other political systems. During the "century of humiliation," various political models were imported from the outside without success. This includes the colonial and feudal systems in the 19th century and the Western democratic model in the early 20th century. Only the socialist conception of human rights has been capable of bringing prosperity and a better life to the Chinese people.
One further note. Legitimacy and human rights development in China isn't a paternalistic affair. The interests of the people not only drive policy in China but the Chinese people possess numerous mechanisms to participate in the running of the country. This means that while China prioritizes economic human rights, political human rights play an important role in facilitating a balanced and harmonious society.
GT: The definition of human rights in the US and the West has become narrower and narrower. They place too much emphasis on political rights while ignore the most basic human rights to survival and development. Why don't the most basic human rights such as people's rights to health, survival and development get enough attention in the West?
Haiphong: The West has for centuries been driven by a model of development that places profit accumulation over the rights of the people. And it isn't just a benign profit that drives all development in the West, but capitalist profit which tends to concentrate wealth in the hands of a few private investors and monopolies. The anarchy of the market reigns supreme, and it is private monopoly capital which essentially dictates government policy. People's need for housing, gainful employment, and healthcare are viewed as profitable ventures in and of themselves. This means that their administration is built around exploitation rather than human development.
The US, for example, is the so-called richest country in the world yet has millions of people without healthcare, a place to live, or a job that can satisfy the basic needs of survival. Hundreds of thousands of people sleep on the street each night, and still more find themselves filing for bankruptcy due to medical debt. Students attending university carry with them the weight of more than a trillion in collective student loan debt to private loan servicers and banks. Political parties in Washington DC hold the view that these issues are incapable of being resolved but that private military and financial institutions should be subsidized in the hundreds of billions. The US political system doesn't just ignore the needs of the people, it proactively worsens the economic situation for the majority.
GT: What is the significance of China's human rights proposition for redefining human rights worldwide, especially for developing countries to explore their own path in human rights development and protecting people's fundamental rights?
Haiphong: China's position on human rights provides a model for countries with shared histories of Western-imposed colonialism and development. Sovereignty and respect for self-determination are prerequisites for these countries to choose their own development paths. Unfortunately, due to unilateral measures such as sanctions and unequal trade arrangements, the US and the West have prevented many countries the opportunity to exercise sovereignty in their development paths. This has caused great suffering and strife worldwide.
China's approach to human rights prioritizes sovereignty and the right to development, and these principles have been applied to the implementation of socialism with Chinese characteristics. Economic development serves everyone, not just rich investors inside or outside of China. Furthermore, China's economic growth has not been achieved through isolationism but rather robust cooperation with all countries on the basis of equality. Developing countries seeking to both exercise their sovereignty while also reaping the benefits of increased global connectivity can look to China as a model of how the rights of the people do not need to be sacrificed for economic growth and vice versa.
China-EU leaders' meetings send positive signal towards world peace, development: Vice FM
Chinese President President Xi meets with European Council President Charles Michel and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen via video link at the 23rd China-EU leaders' meeting on April 1, 2022.
Photo: Xinhua
Chinese President Xi Jinping, during a video meeting with EU leaders on Friday, offered four suggestions on how China and the EU can cooperate to help with the current Ukraine crisis, especially on supporting the EU play a primary role in promoting communication among the EU, the US and NATO and finding solutions to build an effective and sustainable EU security framework.
Observers said that China is offering pragmatic solutions to the EU while encouraging the EU to be diplomatically independent on the Ukraine crisis; and instead of pressuring China to join in sanctioning Russia and being kidnapped by the US, the EU should take control of its own destiny and take action for its security.
President Xi met with European Council President Charles Michel and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen via video link at the 23rd China-EU leaders' meeting on Friday and exchanged views on bilateral cooperation and the Ukraine crisis.
China finds it deeply regrettable that the situation in Ukraine has come to where it is today. China's position on the Ukraine issue is consistent and clear-cut. China always stands on the side of peace and draws its conclusions independently based on the merits of each matter.
While offering suggestions to help with the Ukraine crisis, Xi said that China supports the EU's efforts toward a political settlement of the Ukraine issue, and has been encouraging peace talks in its own way. China will stay in touch with the EU to prevent a bigger humanitarian crisis.
Xi noted that the root cause of the Ukraine crisis is regional security tensions in Europe that have built over the years. A fundamental solution is to accommodate the legitimate security concerns of all relevant parties. China supports Europe, especially the EU, in playing a primary role, and supports Europe, Russia, the US and NATO in holding dialogue to face up to the tensions that have built up over the years and find solutions for a balanced, effective and sustainable security framework in Europe.
Xi also pointed out that China and the EU need to commit themselves to keeping the situation under control, preventing a spillover of the crisis, and, most importantly, keeping the system, rules and foundation of the world economy stable, to bolster public confidence.
Xi's four proposals on the Ukraine crisis are pragmatic and rational, and take into account the long-term considerations. Since the crisis has already taken place, the key was not to emotionally blame each other but to offer practical solutions, Wang Yiwei, director of the institute of international affairs at the Renmin University of China, told the Global Times.
Xi's proposals highlighted the potential cooperative areas for China and the EU to help ease the situation based on the consensus that both China and the EU called for a ceasefire and peace talks, Wang said.
To prevent a regional conflict from spreading also shows that the West should not just impose sanctions but to cut their losses, Wang said, warning that too many sanctions may result in economic stagnation, inflation and even a debt crisis for Europe.
Hours before the China-EU leaders' meetings on Friday, Chinese analysts warned that China-EU relations cannot be kidnapped by the Ukraine crisis, and Europe should no longer be abducted by the US in foreign policy, as it will greatly undermine the EU's own interests, making it difficult to ensure economic recovery and people's livelihood, and runs counter to Europe's aim of pursuing strategic independence.
Before the talks, several sources from Europe claimed that Brussels is seeking to warn Beijing about supporting Russia in the Ukraine crisis, and some EU officials said any help from China to Russia would "jeopardize" relations with its biggest trade partners - Europe and the US - saying trade between China and the bloc is much higher than that between China and Russia.
The EU should have a clear understanding that standing with the West to sanction Russia does not conform to the principle of China's diplomacy, Cui Hongjian, director of the Department of European Studies at the China Institute of International Studies, told the Global Times on Friday.
"The EU is now kidnapped by the US on security, but that does not conform to the strategic independence the EU has pursued," Cui said, noting that to avoid being caught in hot water again, the EU must take control of its own destiny. And developing ties with China provides the EU an opportunity to develop in a more balanced and comprehensive way in the long run.
It will result in a great negative impact on the EU if it takes trade measures against China. "Especially amid the impact of an energy ban with Russia, damaging trade cooperation with China will make Europe fail to ensure its post-pandemic economic recovery and people's livelihood," Cui said, noting the EU would be "very unwise" to do that.
Expanding cooperation
During the talks on Friday, President Xi also pointed out that the Ukraine crisis has come on top of a protracted COVID-19 pandemic and a faltering global recovery. Against such a backdrop, China and the EU, as two major forces, big markets and great civilizations, should increase communication on their relations and on major issues concerning global peace and development, and play a constructive role in adding stabilizing factors to a turbulent world.
Xi stressed that, since last year, China-EU relations have made new progress despite challenges, and China-EU cooperation has achieved new results despite difficulties. It has been proven that China and the EU share extensive common interests and a solid foundation for cooperation, and that only through cooperation and coordination can the two sides resolve problems and rise to challenges.
President Michel and President von der Leyen said that China is an important force in the world. The EU attaches great importance to China's international standing and role, and to developing relations with China. The EU reaffirmed its commitment to the one-China principle and expressed its desire for candid exchanges with China to sustain the good momentum of EU-China relations. It also expressed readiness to keep deepening cooperation with China
The past year has seen growing challenges in China-EU relations, especially after the China-EU Comprehensive Agreement on Investment was stalled by the unilateral freeze taken by the European Parliament in May. However, economic and trade ties between the two remain strong and continue to expand. In the first two months of 2022, the EU surpassed ASEAN as China's biggest trading partner after losing the spot in 2021, as trade between China and the EU surged 14.8 percent year-on-year at $137.16 billion.
"China and the EU can work together in dealing with some of the impact of the Ukraine crisis or the global economy by establishing pragmatic cooperation mechanisms, which will also benefit China-EU relations," Cui said.
On the Ukraine crisis, China and the EU, as two major powers, could strengthen cooperation on promoting peace talks between Russia and Ukraine, and between Russia and the US, and provide humanitarian assistance to Ukraine as well as explore economic cooperation to achieve a stable world economy, analysts said.
Xi's speech highlighted that China and the EU should act as two major forces, and offset uncertainties in the international landscape with the stability of China-EU relations, Wang said.
Wang stressed that stable China-EU relations meant that their relations cannot be abducted by the Ukraine crisis, human rights issues or by some countries like Lithuania.
In a contrasting move to
its pressuring of European allies to not buy Russian oil against the
backdrop of the ongoing Ukraine crisis, the US increased crude oil
supplies from Russia by 43 percent, or 100,000 barrels per day, over the
past week, Russian Security Council Deputy Secretary Mikhail Popov told
Russian media on Sunday, with critics pointing out that the US pursues
its own interests at the costs of its European allies.
China called for cooperation with the EU as Chinese
Premier Li Keqiang stressed on Friday that the two sides should seek
"new highlights" in their relationship and strengthen "policy
coordination" in major areas.
China US Illustration: Liu Rui/GT
Danny Haiphong. Photo:Courtesy of Haiphong
