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US-China relations
ChinaDiplomacy

US lawmakers prepare a sweeping effort to counter China

  • The Senate Foreign Relations Committee will meet next week to consider legislation intended to beat back Beijing’s expanding global influence
  • The Strategic Competition Act of 2021 addresses economic competition with China, as well as issues like Hong Kong and Xinjiang

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The bipartisan draft legislature reflects hard-line sentiment on dealings with China from both Democrats and Republicans in Congress. Photo: AP
Robert Delaneyin Washington

US lawmakers plan to introduce legislation next week that would put additional sanctions on Chinese officials, build closer US relations with Taiwan and place more checks on Beijing’s military operations and territorial claims, among other measures intended to counter China.

Bob Menendez of New Jersey, the Senate Foreign Relations Committee’s Democratic chairman, and Jim Risch of Idaho, its senior Republican, said on Thursday that they would introduce the Strategic Competition Act of 2021 for debate by the committee on Wednesday.

“I am incredibly proud to announce this unprecedented bipartisan effort to mobilise all US strategic, economic and diplomatic tools for an Indo-Pacific strategy that will allow our nation to truly confront the challenges China poses to our national and economic security,” Menendez said.

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The bill calls for sanctions against Chinese officials accused of “forced labour, forced sterilisation and other abuses in Xinjiang”, where human rights groups cite United Nations reports and witness accounts that as many as 1 million Uygurs and other Muslim minorities are held in “re-education camps”. Beijing has repeatedly denied the allegations, insisting that the camps are vocational training facilities.

On Xinjiang, the bill aligns partly with the way that the administrations of President Joe Biden and his predecessor, Donald Trump, have dealt with China. Both put sanctions on officials accused of human rights abuses in Xinjiang, saying the actions constitute genocide.

However, the Menendez-Risch bill stops short of applying the genocide label. The word appears nowhere in the 281-page piece of legislation.

The bill would also earmark US$10 million “to promote democracy in Hong Kong” and require the State Department to produce a report on “the extent to which the government of China uses the status of Hong Kong to circumvent the laws and protections of the United States”.

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