China branded U.S. democracy a “weapon of mass destruction” on Saturday, following the U.S.-organised Summit for Democracy which aimed to shore up like-minded allies in the face of autocratic regimes.
China was left out of the two-day virtual summit and responded by angrily accusing U.S. President Joe Biden of stoking Cold War-era ideological divides.
“’Democracy’ has long become a ‘weapon of mass destruction’ used by the U.S. to interfere in other countries,” a Foreign Ministry spokesperson said in an online statement, which also accused the U.S. of having “instigated ‘colour revolutions’” overseas.
The Ministry also claimed the summit was organised by the U.S. to “draw lines of ideological prejudice, instrumentalise and weaponise democracy... (and) incite division and confrontation.” Instead, Beijing vowed to “resolutely resist and oppose all kinds of pseudo-democracies”.
‘People’s democracy’
Ahead of the summit, China ramped up a propaganda blitz criticising U.S. democracy as corrupt and a failure.
Instead, it touted its own version of “whole-process people’s democracy” in a white paper released last week that aimed to shore up legitimacy for the ruling Communist Party, which has become increasingly authoritarian under President Xi Jinping.
While the U.S. has repeatedly denied there will be another Cold War with China, tensions between the world’s two largest economies have spiralled in recent years over issues including trade and technological competition, human rights, Xinjiang and Taiwan.
Taiwan, a democratic self-ruling island that is claimed by China, was invited to the U.S. summit in a clear snub to its larger neighbour.
