Peter Koenig / PressTV Interview – Transcript / 20 May 2023
Background
China has hit back at the group of seven developed countries, expressing its strong dissatisfaction with G7 communiqué that took aim at Beijing on issues including the South China Sea.
A spokesman for the Chinese foreign ministry said the G-7’s approach has no international credibility whatsoever, it insists on manipulating China-related issues. The spokesman added that the G7 trumpets that it wants to move towards a peaceful, stable, and prosperous world, but in fact, it is hindering world peace, undermining regional stability and inhibiting the development of other countries. Earlier, G7 countries issued a statement, accusing China of coercion. They said they were gravely concerned about territorial disputes in the South China Sea.
PressTV:
What is your take on this?
PK Answer
First, the world must know that the G7 is only a group of power-thirsty western countries, considering themselves the cream of the crop – but listen well – they have absolutely no legitimacy in the world.
They are not even an established NGO. Yet, they want to dictate the world along with other similar such non-institutions, like the G20 and the World Economic Forum (WEF), what the rest of the universe must do, whom they must listen to – and who calls the shots.
At least China and Russia, and ever more countries of the east, and increasingly also the west, and / or Global South, are resisting this One Polar World Order, or what they call “rules-based order”.
It says exactly what it is, its rules made by those self-imposed rulers, not based on any international laws, without any international legitimacy. None whatsoever.
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Now, it is no coincidence that this G7 meeting is hosted by Japan – and in Hiroshima, the city of utter devastation by a US nuclear device in August 1945, just days before Japan’s official rendition. The G7 want to increase their intimidation on China by talking from an eastern neighbor, almost 80 years ago destroyed by the US, now totally sold to the corrupted west.
What many people do not know, is that recently Washington promised Japan – if they take a firm anti-China and pro-western stance in questions of the South China Sea, foremost Taiwan, but also on North Korea – they would be rewarded by Washington – with nuclear protection.
Can you imagine, how far the world – the western world – has gone? Blackmail, corruption – no end. And where there is a corruptor, there must be a corruptee – otherwise the deal does not work.
No ethics left – no chance for peace with such pretexts and values of aggression, just pure domination.
Attesting to aggression is the NATO presence at the G7 meeting in Japan. Their attendance has a significant role.
Japan has already called on NATO to open an office in Japan – that would be the first in Asia.
Times are long gone when NATO was the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, the post WWII “protective umbrella” – what they pretended to be — it has long become the west’s deadliest war machine, stretching its tentacles around the globe as it feels fit – all funded by the US and its vassal European allies. Looks like the next tentacle-stop is Japan.
In 1991, when the Soviet Union came to an end, NATO membership was 12, the founding members of the defense / war treaty organization. Today, May 2023, membership has grown to 31 with all new members being in Europe and ever-more encircling Russia.
And this despite the promise by the US government of George H. W. Bush (father Bush), not one inch to the east [of Berlin] – one of the worst infractions on peace since the end of WWII.
Western money is deviated by NATO members for war and killing, money that could be used at home productively, for poverty alleviation, economic development, job creation. Poverty in the west is rampant oscillating between 25% and 30% of the population. But do not expect the mainstream to speak about it.
That is why NATO is now also in Japan — trying to make a menacing impression on China.
To those who know that sheer power and demonstrated hegemony will NEVER win – not with the most formidable financial backing – against humanity, against the human strive to live together in Peace and to cooperate – this Japan G7 event should be a signal, from which looking forward may become a good lesson for the people of the world. It is not a question of if, but a question of when, the western system implodes.
Sad is, that on the way there many people may be killed, injured, and driven into misery, by non-warranted, nonsensical wars and conflicts, all in a futile attempt to keep western hegemony alive.
It is nothing but propaganda to the rest of the ignorant planet’s inhabitants, who have not yet realized that G7 is no legitimate entity, nor G20, nor the WEF, nor the Bilderbergers – which are, as we speak, meeting in a secretive location near Lisbon, Portugal – they are all make-believe talking sessions of the rich and powerful – to intimidate the world.
But they have ZERO legitimacy.
What really counts is what we see developing in the East – through the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), through Chinas Belt and Road Initiative, through the BRICS – it is an ever-growing attempt at peaceful cooperation around the world, at establishing diplomatic relations and common projects – at building, rather than demolishing.
PressTV
What do you believe Washington wants to achieve with this G7 event in Japan?
Are they not aware of what is really going on? – Besides, Washington and by extension NATO, are already so much overburdened with wars and conflicts around the world, that they could hardly afford another conflict, one with China, of all countries.
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PK
From my perspective, this “intimidation maneuver” is pure propaganda. Talking about Taiwan, the key issue played out by Washington and its western puppet allies, the US and most EU governments know that there is no chance in the world that the US / NATO could start a new conflict with China.
Not only is China’s army at least at par with the western monsters, but China would not be alone. Her closest ally, Russia, would be immediately on China’s side. And that unperturbed by the war they fight on the Ukraine front.
Also, ties between Taiwan and mainland China have been growing ever stronger over the past years, with the CCP being strongly invested in Taiwan and vice-versa. Executives on both ends of corporate and financial business, travel back and forth between the political and economic power centers of mainland China, Beijing, Shanghai, Shenzhen and others – and Taipei.
There is a natural interaction, that has been growing ever more solid over the past years. It is also just a question of time, when Taiwan will be naturally integrated into mainland China – peacefully, if the west does not interfere. And the west does not have the means to interfere, although they keep pretending, they do.
Let us look at reality, if we glance at the world today, there are at least 7 active wars waging throughout the globe, most if not all, initiated by the US / NATO war machine, plus numerous conflicts around the planet. In summary, the West destroys, kills, and abolishes economies, livelihoods, for the sake of its full spectrum dominance – One World Order.
But their capacity is limited. The US military budget may be the world’s largest, but it is blown out of proportion, because the known corruption of the US military industrial complex, the US war machine may be overpriced by as much as a factor of 10.
Waging wars on 7 fronts and supplying hundreds of billions of dollars-worth of arms to Ukraine – and through it to the black-market – the west has hardly enough firepower left to start a new conflict.
While the West aggresses and destroys, the East is constructing, building new relations, linking countries together with refreshed diplomacy – see Iran – Saudi Arabia, with hopefully an end to the horrendous 8-year long Saudi / US / UK war against Yemen.
The Chinese diplomacy initiative is seeking to improve the balance of power- working towards a peaceful multi-polar world.
Multi-polar is the solution for a world in a better equilibrium.
There is no way around it if we want Peace – and that is what the East wants – while the west literally lives off wars, off conflicts. The US economy would collapse, if tomorrow were Peace.
It is the war machine that is the backbone of the western world’s economy.
Peter Koenig is a geopolitical analyst and a former Senior Economist at the World Bank and the World Health Organization (WHO), where he worked for over 30 years around the world. He lectures at universities in the US, Europe and South America. He writes regularly for online journals and is the author of Implosion – An Economic Thriller about War, Environmental Destruction and Corporate Greed; and co-author of Cynthia McKinney’s book “When China Sneezes: From the Coronavirus Lockdown to the Global Politico-Economic Crisis” (Clarity Press – November 1, 2020) Peter is a Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG). He is also a non-resident Senior Fellow of the Chongyang Institute of Renmin University, Beijing.
Published by Press TV
Republished by The 21st Century
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