US Justice Department official calls China a ‘foreign adversary’ that lacks commitment to rule of law
- Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein criticises Beijing, particularly over Uygur detentions
- His remarks reflect Trump administration positions that cast China as a threat on multiple fronts
US Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein called China a “foreign adversary”, described its recent arrests of some foreign citizens as a form of political retaliation and said that the country’s placement of ethnic Uygurs into camps showed that Beijing lacks modern judicial standards.
“As we seek to build bridges with foreign adversaries, it’s important for us to understand the differing visions that underlay their legal systems,” Rosenstein said at the Washington-based Centre for Strategic and International Studies, in a live-streamed discussion about “defending rule of law norms”.
“In China, for example, the Supreme Court urged government officials to resist Western-style judicial independence, deriding it as erroneous and mistaken,” Rosenstein said.
Rosenstein’s comments reflect positions taken by the Trump administration about the degree to which Beijing has become an adversary on multiple fronts – a departure from previous administrations, which have largely sought closer relations since the establishment of formal diplomatic relations in 1979.
US President Donald Trump claimed in his first comprehensive national security strategy in December 2017 that China and Russia are “attempting to erode American security and prosperity” and that the two countries “want to shape a world antithetical to US values and interests”.
