Wang Wenbin, China’s Foreign Ministry Spokesperson, held his regular press conference in Beijing, on May 11th, and answered a reporter’s question: “It was reported that the G7 Summit to be held in Japan will ask China to abide by international rules. Do you have any comment?” by saying that those countries are hypocritical for accusing others of violating the never-defined stock phrase of the U.S. Government “international rules.” He said:
The US has spied indiscriminately on countries globally, not least its G7 allies, strong-armed countries diplomatically, and applied economic coercion and military interference. The US has blatantly invaded Afghanistan, Iraq and Syria and other countries that are smaller and weaker than the US, killing and displacing tens of millions of innocent civilians. When it comes to international rules, the US’s place is in the dock. It is in no position to point fingers at other countries.
His statement that “When it comes to international rules, the US’s place is in the dock” suggests that “international rules” means the same thing as “international laws,” but the U.S. Government, and its allies, have never defined what the term “international rules” means, nor what international body sets those “rules,” nor where they are codified, nor what they are. If those “rules” are international laws, then it would be easy to document which Government violates them more than any other Government does, because obviously that is the U.S. Government itself.
Wenbin’s answer also included the following:
When the G7 talk about international rules, they mean the Western rules that draw lines according to ideologies and values and the US-first and G7-dominated rules of a small circle. Those rules serve the vested interest of a very few countries, including the G7, rather than the common interests of the international community.
By “the international community,” he was referring to the General Assembly of the United Nations. It is the U.N., and not the U.S. Government, which establishes those laws. Wengbin opened his answer by talking about that:
Before discussing international rules, we need to first of all make clear what exactly the international rules are. For the overwhelming majority of countries in the world, international rules consist of the basic norms governing international relations based on the purposes and principles of the UN Charter and all countries must abide by them. The G7 hardly ever mentions the UN Charter, but keeps talking about “democracies” and the so-called “rules-based international order.”
His answer was openly mocking the G7 countries as being hypocrites.
This content originally appeared on Dissident Voice and was authored by Eric Zuesse.