Straight News: The 60th Munich Security Conference opened in Munich, Germany on Friday, ** Politburo member and Foreign Minister Wang Yi led a delegation to attend, and will deliver a keynote speech at the "China Session" event on Saturday local time, Mr. Guan, what is your outlook for this?
Guan Yao, Special Commentator: The Munich Security Conference is known as the "D**os of Defense" in the Western world. According to China's official statement, the meeting is an annual forum on international strategy and security policy with important global influence, and China has sent high-level representatives to participate in it on many occasions. To put it bluntly, this is the arena where the United States and the West take the lead and set the security and defense agenda, hosted by "old Europe". In the past 60 years, due to the continuous prolongation of the two large-scale armed conflicts in Asia and Europe, the issue of war and security anxiety have been significantly magnified. According to the organizers, the 60th MUAN will focus on five areas: defense, global order, personnel security, sustainable development and technology. CNBC even believes that this meeting will be the most influential in the 60-year history of the MUAN, with an estimated 60 national leaders and more than 80 leaders, including the leaders of the two countries involved in the conflict, namely Zelensky of Ukraine and Herzog of Israel and Palestinian Prime Minister Eshitaya.
However, the US-Western dominated venue did not prevent the topic of China from becoming the focus of the meeting, and the three-day agenda of this year's MUAN meeting arranged four country-specific sessions, namely the United States, Ukraine, Germany and China, with Germany as the host and Chancellor Scholz as the keynote speaker. The special session for Ukraine, delivered by Zelensky, will focus on winning military aid and other external support for Ukraine. Tonight's American session will be delivered by Deputy Harris. Christoph Hoisgen, chairman of the conference, was a former diplomatic adviser to former German Chancellor Angela Merkel and also served as Germany's ambassador to the United Nations.
At the same time, it should be emphasized that the US-Western dominance does not prevent China from actively influencing and shaping the agenda of the conference, and Wang Yi will forcefully explain China's position and propositions, and will once again directly state his core interests and major concerns.
Straight News: So in your opinion, what are the "China focuses" of this meeting, and how do you analyze other important agendas of this meeting?
Guan Yao, Special Commentator: Wang Yi's speech at the China session of the MUAN meeting at noon tomorrow (17 July) will definitely be a key concern for all parties. This is the second consecutive year that Wang Yi has participated in the meeting, and some foreign media have commented that Wang Yi's participation in the meeting last year has set off what China calls "European charm offensive", that is, "European charm offensive".
In his speech last year, Wang Yi talked about the famous statue of the Angel of Peace in Munich, stressing that China and Europe, as the two major forces, two major markets and two major civilizations in the process of multipolarization, will not form bloc confrontation if they choose dialogue and cooperation, and if they choose peace and stability, they will not be able to fight a new Cold War. This is also China's consistent position and stance on China-EU relations, which Chinese leaders have repeatedly reiterated on various occasions over the past year. On the current situation and future of China-EU relations, as well as the management of differences, Wang Yi will once again give a comprehensive explanation tomorrow.
When talking about the Russia-Ukraine conflict in Munich last year, Wang Yi stressed that China's policy on the Ukraine issue boils down to one sentence, that is, to promote peace talks, and will issue "China's position on the political settlement of the Ukraine crisis" to this end. He said even more sharply and bluntly that some countries are not happy to see peace talks, and they do not care at all about the life and death of Ukrainians, nor do they care about the all-round impact on Europe, and their strategic goals are even greater than those of Ukraine. Such insights are being confirmed by the development of the Russia-Ukraine conflict, which is about to enter its third year, and China's position paper on promoting a political settlement of the Ukraine crisis has been officially released. In this regard, Wang Yi's speech at the Mu'an meeting tomorrow will once again convey the certainty and stability of the path of Chinese-style modernization.
Personally, I believe that these two major themes are undoubtedly the biggest concern of the outside world when looking at another focus of the MU'an meeting. But will U.S. Deputy Prime Minister Harris's speech after the welcome dinner at the Mu'an meeting tonight allow Europe to see the certainty and stability of the United States? Can the so-called "Trump panic" in European allies be alleviated or even quelled? I think it's very hanging. Trump's latest blackmailing of allies with "enough money", threatening that "the United States will sit idly by and watch Russia arbitrarily send out", can Harris really make substantial reassurance? What about the military aid to Ukraine that is stuck in the House of Representatives? The New York Times said today (16th) that Harris will try to convince global leaders that she and Biden can win in November, but Europe is currently considering making contingency plans for "Trump's second term".
Of course, the bilateral diplomacy outside the Mu'an venue is also a great attraction. The US media has predicted in advance that the Chinese and US foreign ministers will meet in Munich on Friday. Wang Yi and Blinken also met on the sidelines last year, but that meeting was almost "forced" by the US side. At this time last year, when the balloon incident had a serious impact on China-US relations, Wang Yi denounced the US side for its hysterical reaction and irrationality at the venue of the Mu'an meeting. In this sense, Munich can be described as a starting point for the phased restart of Sino-US relations last year. At a time when China and the United States are advancing the implementation of the consensus reached at the summit of the two heads of state at Philory Manor in California and fully resuming high-level exchanges and communication, the reunion between Wang Yi and Blinken in Munich at this time is certainly a world away from last year's scene.
Author丨Guan Yao, special commentator of Shenzhen Satellite TV's "Live Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan".