While US politicians grapple with how to reopen their shuttered government and avoid a potentially disastrous default on their debt, the world should consider ‘de-Americanizing’, a commentary by Xinhua news agency said yesterday.
“As US politicians of both political parties [fail to find a] viable deal to bring normality to the body politic they brag about, it is perhaps a good time for the befuddled world to start considering building a de-Americanized world,” the commentary said.
In a lengthy polemic against US hegemony since World War II, it added: “Such alarming days when the destinies of others are in the hands of a hypocritical nation have to be terminated.”
“A new world order should be put in place, according to which all nations, big or small, poor or rich, can have their key interests respected and protected on an equal footing,” it said.
Negotiations over how to end the budgetary impasse have shifted to the US Senate after House Representatives failed to strike a deal with US Barack President Obama on extending borrowing authority ahead of the deadline on Thursday.
Beijing has in recent days issued warnings as well as appeals for a deal, all the while emphasizing the inseparable economic ties that bind the world’s two biggest economies.
“The cyclical stagnation in Washington for a viable bipartisan solution over a federal budget and an approval for raising the debt ceiling has again left many nations’ tremendous [US] dollar assets in jeopardy and the international community highly agonized,” the commentary said.
China is the biggest foreign holder of US Treasury bonds, worth a total of US$1.28 trillion, according to US government data.
“Instead of honoring its duties as a responsible leading power, a self-serving Washington has abused its superpower status and introduced even more chaos into the world by shifting financial risks overseas,” but equally stoked “regional tensions amid territorial disputes, and fighting unwarranted wars under the cover of outright lies” the commentary said.
It added that emerging economies should have a greater say in major international financial institutions the World Bank and the IMF, and proposed a “new international reserve currency that is to be created to replace the dominant US dollar.”
China has only slightly more weight than Italy at the IMF, which has been headed by a European since its creation in 1944.
A governance reform has been in the works for three years, but its implementation has been blocked by the effective veto of the US.
The combined effect of the monsoon, the outer rim of Typhoon Fengshen and a low-pressure system is expected to bring significant rainfall this week to various parts of the nation, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. The heaviest rain is expected to occur today and tomorrow, with torrential rain expected in Keelung’s north coast, Yilan and the mountainous regions of Taipei and New Taipei City, the CWA said. Rivers could rise rapidly, and residents should stay away from riverbanks and avoid going to the mountains or engaging in water activities, it said. Scattered showers are expected today in central and
COOPERATION: Taiwan is aligning closely with US strategic objectives on various matters, including China’s rare earths restrictions, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said Taiwan could deal with China’s tightened export controls on rare earth metals by turning to “urban mining,” a researcher said yesterday. Rare earth metals, which are used in semiconductors and other electronic components, could be recovered from industrial or electronic waste to reduce reliance on imports, National Cheng Kung University Department of Resources Engineering professor Lee Cheng-han (李政翰) said. Despite their name, rare earth elements are not actually rare — their abundance in the Earth’s crust is relatively high, but they are dispersed, making extraction and refining energy-intensive and environmentally damaging, he said, adding that many countries have opted to
FORCED LABOR: A US court listed three Taiwanese and nine firms based in Taiwan in its indictment, with eight of the companies registered at the same address Nine companies registered in Taiwan, as well as three Taiwanese, on Tuesday were named by the US Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) as Specially Designated Nationals (SDNs) as a result of a US federal court indictment. The indictment unsealed at the federal court in Brooklyn, New York, said that Chen Zhi (陳志), a dual Cambodian-British national, is being indicted for fraud conspiracy, money laundering and overseeing Prince Holding Group’s forced-labor scam camps in Cambodia. At its peak, the company allegedly made US$30 million per day, court documents showed. The US government has seized Chen’s noncustodial wallet, which contains
SUPPLY CHAIN: Taiwan’s advantages in the drone industry include rapid production capacity that is independent of Chinese-made parts, the economic ministry said The Executive Yuan yesterday approved plans to invest NT$44.2 billion (US$1.44 billion) into domestic production of uncrewed aerial vehicles over the next six years, bringing Taiwan’s output value to more than NT$40 billion by 2030 and making the nation Asia’s democratic hub for the drone supply chain. The proposed budget has NT$33.8 billion in new allocations and NT$10.43 billion in existing funds, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said. Under the new development program, the public sector would purchase nearly 100,000 drones, of which 50,898 would be for civil and government use, while 48,750 would be for national defense, it said. The Ministry of
RSS