Behind Cuba crisis is US politics, intervention and trade embargo

By: Azhar Azam

The history of U.S. antipathy toward Cuba and intervention in the Caribbean island harks back to early 1960s when Washington failed to overthrow Cuban revolutionist leader Fidel Castro during the Bay of Pigs invasion. Loss of U.S.-backed Fulgencio Batista and a Soviet-inclined government next door at the height of the Cold War was a lethal brew for America.


Since then, Washington's Cuba policy has been dominated at isolating Havana economically through an adulterous trade embargo. After the collapse of the Soviet Union, American blockade of the small economy was noticed by the international world that chose to withdraw its support for "unjust" financial and trade restrictions, costing Cuban people a total of $130 billion in six decades.

Former U.S. President Barack Obama in 2014 tried to shift the ineffective strategy and rescinded Cuba's designation as state of sponsor of international terrorism, restored diplomatic relationship and eased off sanctions on travel and remittances, among other measures. But the détente was suspended after Donald Trump took office.

More than 240 economic sanctions including a slew of new politically-driven measures before the 2020 U.S. presidential election returned Trump votes of the large Cuban-American population in South Florida. Yet crippling curbs deeply hurt a fragile economy, "really" affected Cuban people and contributed to food and medicine famines.

Before Trump was routed out of the White House, his administration made sure that Cuban people were completely squeezed and did not receive any respite from the United States. Just days away from his departure, he put back Cuba to the list of state sponsors of terrorism and ripped off all diplomatic norms to blacklist Cuban Interior Minister Lazaro Alberto Alvarez Casas.

Joe Biden on the campaign trail vowed to reverse Trump's policy, which had "inflicted harm" to Cuban economy and added to worsening shortages of food and medicine. Nonetheless, once took oath as the U.S. president, he ignored advice of 80 House Democrats' advice in March to repeal the prior administration's "cruel" sanctions and overturn politicized decisions and opted to follow his predecessor.

Disregarding Cubans' calls to lift sanctions, the Biden administration on June 23 opposed a United Nations General Assembly resolution to terminate the U.S. embargo and exposed its willingness of reconciliation.

The near-unanimous vote for 29th consecutive time condemned America's sanctions and invited the ire of some leading international nations such as Beijing and Moscow, demanding Washington to end interference in Havana.

Many Democrats still are pressing Biden to waive sanctions on Cuba. They call on him to help Cubans by rescinding Trump-era sanctions and offering additional humanitarian and vaccine assistance to them as well as have "outright" rejected administration's defense of the embargo and use of "cruelty" as a point of leverage against ordinary folks.

On the other way around, the U.S. president is suppressing progressive voices in his own party as he designated head of Cuba's Ministry of the Revolutionary Armed Forces Alvaro Lopez Miera and Ministry of Interior's National Special Brigade.

Biden's response, outlined in a call with hardliners in Miami and welcomed by infamous Cuba-American Republican Marco Rubio, revealed the political nature of the new measures that appeared to strengthen his position in Florida.

Biden, after secession from his commitment with Cuban people, labeled Havana government a "failed state" and intended to mull over options to reinstate the internet outages. While it's a paradigmatic case of foreign intervention, his temptation to receive cash remittances from Cuban-American wasn't short of incitement to violence.

This forms an opinion that Biden's vacillation to assist Cuban people fight health and economic challenges has nothing to do with the human rights; it is aimed at politicking to avoid increased risk of losing a slim majority in the House in 2022 from Florida, where Miami in 2020 deprived Democrats of two Congress members for pursuing normalization policy.

Cuba clearly is gripped with widespread protests owing to the death of food, medicine and electricity due to persistent U.S. "politics of economic asphyxiation". By politicizing Cuban crisis, keeping crudest measures intact and stoking social divide and violence in the Caribbean island, Biden, like Trump, wants to choke Cuban economy to force a violent change.

Havana's assertion about the U.S. embargo's role in ravaging Cuba's healthcare is discarded by American media, contending food and medicines are exempt from ban. That's untrue and misleading. In reality, Washington has stopped life-saving drugs bound for the ailing Cubans, causing even deaths, to describe it as having no respect for human life and international law.

Some Western outlets wrongly frame the unrest in Cuba as "World's Big Struggle: Autocracies vs. Democracies." It is not the case either. Exacerbated by pandemic, strife has stemmed from decades-old unwarranted U.S. trade embargo.

The UN resolutions, reaffirming non-intervention and non-interference in other states, and economists have identified such measures for adversely affecting Cuban people and blamed the hardening of American sanctions for shortage of staple foods.

Washington's vain words, shifting the responsibility of Cubans' economic suffering on Havana government and supporting violent demonstrations, won't help the people entrapped in economic and health crises. For that, the U.S. must stop politicizing the issue, bring an end to its intervention and lift the economic, commercial and financial trade embargo on Cuba.

*This is my opinion piece that originally appeared at "China Global Television Network (CGTN)": 

https://news.cgtn.com/news/2021-07-25/Behind-Cuba-s-crisis-is-U-S-politics-intervention-and-trade-embargo-12buRvW8qS4/index.html

Africans deserve to grow with the rest of the world

By: Azhar Azam

A tidal wave of fear continues to rack the imperialist and former U.S. officials who believe China is "kicking our tails nearly everywhere" in Africa. Instead of answering the simple question of Africans: "Where is America with respect to Chinese infrastructure development and funding for health support," they instead garble Beijing's commitment to the continent by pursuing global dominance.

China's policy in Africa – no interference in its regional development path, no meddling in domestic affairs, no imposition of will, no attachment of political strings to assistance and no quest of self-seeking political gains in investment and financing – has been an essential pillar to developing a long-term, stable and ever-strengthening Afro-Sino relationship.

The "five-no" approach and eight major initiatives – industrial promotion, infrastructure connectivity, trade facilitation, green development, capacity building, healthcare, people-to-people exchange and peace and security – irked the U.S. that incorrectly deciphered China's engagement with Africa in "five major lines of efforts" including the allegation that Beijing views the continent as a testing ground for exporting political and economic governance concepts.

By the end of January, China had implemented more than 85 percent of its key initiatives in Africa. Their successful implementation has helped the continent achieve enduring stability and sustainable development. However, Beijing's principle of non-interference has inflicted serious damage to the U.S. false narrative that China's cooperation with Africa is "predatory lending" and which has accused China of attempting to promote an alternative political model of state-led economic growth to over-burden local economies with heavy debt.

Many in the U.S. argue that China invests heavily in Africa due to its abundant natural resources, including strategic materials. That's a void claim as the European Union, not China, is the chief importer of the continent's natural resources, and also because Beijing had years ago reached a number of other sectors in which it has technical expertise like power generation. Sincerity demands world powers follow China in Africa, considering no state alone can resolve the deep energy crisis in the continent.

Western observers, at the same time, should shift their focus on the U.S. lawmakers who are encouraging Joe Biden to improve ties with Africa to accomplish his goal of sourcing more critical minerals and to enhance trade to disengage Beijing from the continent. But the problem lies in the fact that policymakers in Washington don't understand African people, culture and governments. This will make it an uphill battle to change Africa's increasingly pro-China view.

In addition, borrowing from China has greatly contributed to the all-round development on the continent and has closed a wide infrastructure gap. Chinese financing has supported many of Africa's most ambitious infrastructure developments, with at least 80 percent of the $153 billion Beijing pledged between 2000 and 2019 going to economic, social and infrastructure projects including transportation, power, telecommunication networks and water supply.

Beijing, a leading player in developing the African infrastructure, has already agreed to extend debt relief to 19 African nations and has delivered COVID-19 vaccines to more than 40 countries in a region consisting mostly of developing countries. The East Asian country recently signed a deal with Egypt to produce vaccines at local pharmaceutical facilities and is expected to establish manufacturing lines potentially in South Africa and Zambia.

Even before the pandemic, from 2000 to 2018 China wrote off a total of $9.8 billion in debt to other countries, 78 percent (57 percent + 21 percent) of whom saw their debt slate wiped clean or loans turned into gifts. Around 50 percent of Chinese debt cancellations in those 18 years eased pressure from heavily indebted poor nations, including more than 20 African states.

Welcomed by the Elysee Palace and hailed as a "positive development" by Merkel, who earlier said decoupling from China wasn't "the right way to go" in a digital age, "Africa Quad" could open up new areas of international cooperation in a continent struggling to cope with rising debt and acquiring enough jabs to inoculate its people, but it would require infrastructure investment to the tune of 4.5 percent of GDP.

It's untoward on the part of the Western world to label Chinese loans and investments in Africa or elsewhere a "debt trap." This is despite the fact that Deborah Brautigam, director of the China Africa Research Initiative at Johns Hopkins University, had discovered no evidence of asset seizures or alleged Chinese banks' over-lending practices and financing in loss-making projects to swoop in and gain a strong foothold in Africa.

There're just seven African countries whose debt from Beijing represents over 20 percent of external debt for different reasons such as economic limitations to undertake large projects, falling oil prices contracting the economies and reduced capability to pay back loans. The myth of Africa's "Chinese debt problem" is thus being debunked internationally, and thoughts are gathering strength about Beijing's promising relationship with the continent.

Compared to foreign aid given to highly dependent countries that generally wind up in Western offshore financial centers known for bank secrecy and private wealth management, loans and investments from Chinese construction firms and financial institutions to Africa deliver benefits to the African governments and people through visible-on-the-ground infrastructure development projects and growth of the real estate sector.

However, research fellows think the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan can trigger a "butterfly effect" and stoke terrorists to step up extremist activities in West Africa. The watershed moment and threatening tones from American academics toward Africa shelve its neutrality between Beijing and Washington, extremely worrying as this could jeopardize peace and growth across the violence-plagued continent.

It is therefore crucial for the U.S. brain trusts, diplomats and politicians not to vitiate Africa's development by exploiting the continent's vulnerabilities for vested interests and making it a frontline of Washington's competition with Beijing. Embattled with financial crises and health and security challenges, 1.3 billion African people deserve a terror-free environment and support from the international community to make full use of infrastructure development and grow with the rest of the world.

*This is my opinion piece that originally appeared at "China Global Television Network (CGTN)": 

https://news.cgtn.com/news/2021-07-19/Africans-deserve-to-grow-with-the-rest-of-the-world-121rZnmlJ3W/index.html

Pakistan stands up to protect sovereignty and sovereign foreign policy

By: Azhar Azam

From a fervent denial to host U.S. military bases in Pakistan for conducting fool's gold remote strikes in adjacent battle-scarred Afghanistan to throwing staunch support behind all-weather ally China, Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan is in top gear to show the U.S. his foreign policy priorities.

After Washington's 23 Skidoo from Kabul, fears seem to be lingering that Afghanistan could become a safe haven for terrorist outfits to attack the U.S. In response, Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) Director William Burns reportedly carried out a secret mission to kickstart a military partnership with Pakistan in hopes of establishing drone facilities there. But in Islamabad, America's spy chief was denied a meeting with Khan, a critic of U.S. regional policy.

Given U.S. President Joe Biden's indecision to talk with the leader of America's former Cold War ally, which could facilitate crucial Taliban-U.S. peace talks, Khan's powerful message – we will be partners of peace with America rather than conflict – is a setback to Washington's regional ambitions.

Washington has over the years been quite vocal about its aid to Pakistan, either lamenting the "waste" or blowing its own horn over the billions and billions of dollars sent to Islamabad. But given the cost, including more than 70,000 Pakistanis who have been killed from wars in Afghanistan and economic losses of around $150 billion to an already fragile economy, $20 billion in aid just isn't worth it.

Biden's abrupt military withdrawal from Kabul also diminishes Islamabad's leverage to press the Taliban for peace talks with the Afghan government. The move leaves the war-tortured nation prone to another deadly civil war once American troops are completely gone. Militant groups currently control roughly a third of all districts in Afghanistan, which can potentially create space for Al-Qaeda to regroup and plan new attacks on the U.S. and others. These militant groups could also urge Afghan factions to dictate terms in the Taliban's proposed peace plan.

Yet instead of highlighting Biden's catastrophic mistakes in Afghanistan and reluctance to engage Pakistan in the Afghan peace process, the U.S. media is targeting Khan's firm stance to protect his country's national sovereignty by defying American bullying.

Some media also seem to be trying to urge Khan to scale back his resolute support for China. In a foreword to an interview with Khan, for example, the New York Times' Op-Ed editors misinterpreted his zest for China and wish to see cooperation between Beijing and Washington as a desire for more "strategic clout" to bring Islamabad into the "great power competition." Responding to whether Pakistan must "choose sides", Khan said Beijing had been very good to Pakistan when it was taking “a real battering” after and during the "war on terror." Khan added when Pakistan's debt went up, China was the country that came to Pakistan’s help. His high regard for China came across as a clear reference to the U.S. strategic and economic amnesia toward Pakistan.

It wasn't the first time Khan has been unequivocal about China's role in Pakistan's growth and national security interests. After promising to further strengthen relations with China in his victory speech, he has maintained a consistent position of wanting to learn from Chinese development, make the China-Pakistan relationship a cornerstone of his foreign policy, rejected claims of China impinging on Pakistan's sovereignty and linked Islamabad's future to Beijing.

Some U.S. media have also slated Khan for refusing to condemn the alleged Chinese crackdown on Uygurs, arguing he was parroting Beijing's disavowal over Pakistan's economic dependence on China. The claims are bizarre, as Beijing has extended financial support and provided billions of dollars a number of times to bolster foreign exchange reserves and repay Islamabad's foreign debt. Despite all this, Khan has said the Chinese have "never, ever" interfered in Pakistan's foreign or domestic policy.

Unconcerned with accusations, Khan hasn't been interested in damaging the valuable relationship on an issue he thought was "supposedly happening" in Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region. Khan spoke out about the U.S.-led efforts among Western countries to mount pressure on Pakistan to choose sides and downgrade its relations with China. He refused to buckle under the bigoted tricks and reaffirmed the "deep" and "very special" relationship between Pakistan and China would not change no matter what.

Khan understands Beijing's importance in Islamabad's key strategic, economic and developmental areas. For example, he sees the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC), a key pilot project of the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), a transformational project that has already attracted significant Chinese investment and created new jobs. With the second phase of the project focusing on socioeconomic development and industrialization, this cooperation is pushing the ironclad allies even closer together.

Even Western experts and think tanks have debunked the fallacies that China has been parachuting its projects into regional countries via BRI. Noting recipient nations, including Pakistan, had "huge sway over how things unfold," some have admitted Beijing's more adaptive and increasingly accommodative strategy would help Islamabad to address socioeconomic development and step up industrial cooperation.

Another example of cooperation is the China–Pakistan Free Trade Agreement (CPFTA). Beijing in January 2020 agreed to immediately reduce tariffs to zero percent on textiles, leather, furniture, ceramics and other Pakistani exports to China under the second phase of the treaty. Pakistan can now ship more than 1,000 products to China with zero duties, which already boosted Islamabad's exports to Beijing by nearly 70 percent in Q1 of 2021. The treaty will help beef up much-needed foreign exchange reserves and bring greater prosperity to the country.

The U.S. media have also done their best to drive a wedge between two close allies by linking Khan's candor against growing Islamophobia around the world to Uygurs in China. But the strategy failed. Khan exposed the "hypocritical" Western media and reinforced Pakistan's support for Beijing across the One-China Policy and issues of Taiwan, Tibet, Xinjiang, Hong Kong and the South China Sea.

Khan even went the extra mile to laud China's political system that promotes merit in society, providing an alternative model and actually beating the Western democratic form of government in the way it brings up merit in society. Khan has said he believes that the Communist Party of China's "people-centric approach" is the driving force behind China's "astonishing success." He also said he hopes Pakistan can emulate China's "remarkable achievements" of national development, poverty alleviation and anti-corruption.

Khan has made his position clear. He's standing up to the U.S. in the face of the White House's stealthy efforts to erode Pakistan's sovereignty and browbeat Islamabad, including over its strong relationship with China.

*This is my opinion piece that originally appeared at "China Global Television Network (CGTN)": 

https://news.cgtn.com/news/2021-07-08/Pakistan-stands-up-to-protect-sovereignty-and-sovereign-foreign-policy-11JoSD1WLaU/index.html

US should stop undermining peace and growth of Asia Pacific

By: Azhar Azam

The proximity of Asia Pacific to two oceans and several continents as well as the region's three-fifth and two-third contribution in global GDP and international growth makes it a territory of vital strategic and economic importance for the U.S. and other world powers, prodding them to limit China's increasing centrality in regional development.

Beijing is witnessing the fastest expansion of the middle class the world has ever seen. According to Pew's income band classification, between 2000 and 2018, Chinese middle-class number has mushroomed from just 3 percent to more than half of the total population or about 707 million. The likelihood of 1.2 billion Chinese middle class by 2027 offers Asia Pacific a tremendous opportunity to take advantage of China's economic growth.

With Pacific following wider-regional trends and facing a downward pressure on imports and exports, East and North Asia was expected to perform the best than other regions, thanks to China's quick trade and economic recovery. In 2021, Asia Pacific's economic growth forecast of 6.2 percent is again likely to be on the heels of Beijing's 8.3 percent growth.

In view of Asia Pacific's great economic potential, underpinned by China's efforts to boost regional trade and resolve maritime disputes peacefully – the U.S. has been feeling threatened to lose its historical dominant position in the region.

Throughout 2020, the U.S. provoked China in the name of deterrence and successively deployed three carrier strike groups, nuclear attack submarines and bombers to the South China Sea (SCS) as part of its "Dynamic Force Employment." It was despite the fact that Defense Secretary Jim Mattis' concept to deter adversaries by being "strategically predictable, but operationally unpredictable" would bewilder the U.S. allies in the bordering regions of China and Russia about so-called valued practices of transparency and predictability.

Under U.S. President Joe Biden, there is no change in America's aggressive nature. Since he took over from Donald Trump in January, the U.S. warships have so far sailed through the Taiwan Straits six times to stir up tensions in the territory and the wider region. On May 20, a U.S. destroyer even intruded Chinese waterways in the SCS before being driven out by the People's Liberation Army.

Countries in the Asia Pacific are fretful about the belligerent posture of the U.S. Indo-Pacific strategy. They thus want American hawks to try not to contain the world's second-largest economy and seek them to confine Washington's rivalry with Beijing to competition alone. Unfortunately, the U.S. has different plans altogether.

Snubbing the re-conciliatory spirit of the country's allies, the U.S. Department of Defense in May requested $5.1 billion for Pacific Deterrence Initiative. The militaristic program and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin's issuance of directive and acceptance of recommendations of the China Task Force (both classified) – Biden announced in February – aim to laser-focus, bolster deterrence and answer unfounded threats from "the number one pacing challenge," China in the Indo-Pacific region.

Asia Pacific is still in shock over protectionist Trump's withdrawal from the "horrible" Trans-Pacific Partnership. With no Biden's firm plan to join the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership, Washington's brimful economic beef and political malaise toward Beijing will further reinforce region's doubts about U.S. credibility and raucous approach to artificially control a rising China.

In a tense regional backdrop, countries in Asia Pacific would consider China a more reliable partner. Beijing is keen to strengthen economic cooperation and hone the development of the fastest-growing region in the world through Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) and world's largest trade agreement, the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP).

Since the launch of BRI in 2013, scope of Chinese signature tune hasn't stopped from expansion as almost 140 countries and regions have signed up to grand China's vision, trade between Beijing and partner nations exceeds $9.2 trillion and China's direct investments along the mega global project stand at in excess of $130 billion.

The latest data expounds BRI's essential role in boosting the pandemic-hit international trade and re-lifting the regional and global growth. Project's success coupled with the RCEP – which for the first time fastened China, Japan and the Republic of Korea in a trade deal and set to enter in a practical phase later this year – would set a new benchmark for a multilateral cooperation through regional connectivity and further integrate Asia Pacific economies.

China's emergence as a global economic power isn't a source of concern for any country in the region. It's U.S. incitement to hatred that poses threat to regional stability and prosperity, urging all Asia Pacific nations to protect their high economic stakes and the valued peace from America's undermining activities against shared future and growth.

Washington has been at pains to portray Beijing as a challenge to the regional and global economy and security. As more than 100 countries trade twice with China than they do with the U.S., the false representation of China's economic cooperation for sustainable peace to conjure up America's lost soul has been repelled by Asia Pacific and the entire world in chorus.

The growth of all nations in the Asia Pacific and peace across the region are deeply intertwined. This realization about the U.S.-hyped strategic rivalry with China and region's elusion to morph itself into a purveyor of Washington's smear campaign against Beijing should be buttressed to turn the region into a more vibrant economic power and make it a beacon of high-quality development for the rest of the world.

*This is my opinion piece that originally appeared at "China Global Television Network (CGTN)": 

https://news.cgtn.com/news/2021-07-02/U-S-should-stop-undermining-peace-and-growth-of-Asia-Pacific-11zkFQ9Gqre/index.html

Looming end of longtime US containment strategy

By: Azhar Azam

In 1947, then-U.S. President Harry Truman deviated from America's historical position of not meddling in regional conflicts and reoriented an interventionist foreign policy that would provide economic, military and political assistance to all nations under threat from external and internal forces.

The Truman Doctrine – also known as Truman's containment policy, a basic U.S. strategy to fight and contain the Soviet Union in the Cold War – has been religiously pursued by all American presidents. Washington's ruthless pursuit for a unipolar world divided global nations into two blocks and bred conflicts in Asia, Africa and Latin America.

Odd Arne Westad, a Norwegian-born scholar who specializes in the Cold War and contemporary East Asian history, argued that the Cold War, which began on the perimeters of Europe, had deepest reverberations in Asia, Africa and the Middle East where everyone was forced to take sides, a phenomenon still being actively pushed by the U.S. globally. Other than environmental threats, social divides and ethnic conflicts stemmed from that era, there were a few undisclosed areas of hidden U.S. overseas involvement too.

The American LEGION Act, which former U.S. President Donald Trump signed in July 2019, found at least 12 of those unrecognized epochs of covert and overt U.S. foreign interventions.

Afghanistan was a linchpin of the U.S. strategy against the Soviet Union during the Cold War that Washington believed it had won. But Afghan civil war and the ongoing conflict in the country offered one good example of how America's hasty withdrawal hit back and risked international peace and the U.S.' own national security in the coming years.

The Cold War, having compound effects on American lives in the middle of proxy wars around the world and persistent threat of nuclear warfare, ended. However, America's thirst for global supremacy is waking up yet again; this time to contain China's economic rise.

After Trump fantasized to execute Truman's containment policy and ranted about containing China without understanding he would never be able to win the new Cold War – U.S. President Joe Biden's exhausting attempts to court Europe, rally the "brain dead" transatlantic alliance and hire new recruits against China have faltered.

Biden at G7 and NATO meetings failed to carry back desired outcomes and admitted there were differences on China, an issue that shook the alliance before and continues to stoke serious disagreements among European leaders.

Some European leaders, despite saying they didn't think China's an adversary and refusing to descend into a Cold War with it, labeled unwarranted allegations of "systemic challenges" from Beijing. They need not be influenced by the U.S. mindset and must take note of their own economic and trade interests with China where European companies have found a shelter in a pandemic with 60 percent planning to expand their operations.

This European intent not to decouple from China, try to further integrate Europe-China economies and divisions within the bloc and with the U.S. are likely to withstand Washington's feral posture and longing to originate a campaign below the threshold of the Cold War to stymie Chinese growth.

Realizing it can't launch and win the new Cold War, America tried to curry favor with Russia by seeking it to stay neutral in the U.S.-China spat. But Biden's aristocracy to restore elitism and bring some predictability to Washington's relationship with Moscow fizzled out as Putin – anticipating a U.S. stealth objective to keep ties with Russia quieter for keeping focus on China – candidly told reporters Moscow and Washington were no friends and there's only a pragmatic dialogue about interests of their respective countries.

Biden said Putin didn't want a new Cold War. While the Kremlin had already construed its stance about averting such a catastrophe and slammed the U.S. "megaphone diplomacy" – Washington's approach is vague as Biden arrived in Europe after taking daily intelligence briefings from CIA director and former U.S. ambassador to Russia William Burns who's an advocate of Cold War containment strategy against Moscow.

An underlying cause of the U.S. fit of pique therefore isn't all about China's growth; it's every state and any region in quest of a strategic and economic autonomy – including Europe and the rise of Asia as a geoeconomic power, which can challenge American global military and economy hegemony.

Biden, knocked for being "more than a Trojan Horse" and "a puppet" in the U.S., is exerting efforts to assert himself as a global leader and thinking of reaching out to China now. If the U.S. president is sincere in holding constructive talks with the Chinese government, he needs to change track, drop the U.S. containment strategy and move closer to reconciliation that would help defuse tensions, bring stability to the bilateral relationship and calm the tense international environment.

*This is one of my opinion pieces that first appeared at "China Global Television Network (CGTN)": 

https://news.cgtn.com/news/2021-06-22/Looming-end-of-longtime-U-S-containment-strategy-11j5oju5TeE/index.html