SINGAPORE PM CLAIMS CHINA’S DECISIONS, ACTIONS UNSETTLE ASIA-PACIFIC

China’s decisions and foreign policy positions have given rise to “significant” uncertainty and anxiety as countries globally assess their implications, and this is not an ideal situation for Beijing, Singapore’s Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong has said, Kok Xinghui reported for the South China Morning Post (SCMP).

Lee was speaking in an interview with British broadcaster BBC recorded two weeks ago and aired on Sunday, before Beijing on Thursday confirmed it would move ahead with the biggest overhaul of Hong Kong’s electoral system since the city returned to Chinese rule in 1997.

The move was denounced by Western nations including Britain, which said China was now in “a state of ongoing non-compliance” with the 1984 Sino-British Joint Declaration to determine Hong Kong’s future after 1997.

Lee said it was not possible to judge the domestic pressures that had led China to make the decisions it made. “But I think internationally the position it has taken has won it some friends but at the same time, has led to tensions with major powers and with many other countries.”

Referring to public opinion polls such as those done by American think tank the Pew Research Center that tracked sentiments towards China in various countries, he said there was “significant uncertainty and anxiety over which way China is going and whether this will be good for them. I do not think that is in China’s interest.”

Lee was asked about US-China tensions in the interview, and he said while a military clash between the superpowers was likelier now than five years ago, the odds were “not yet high.” But there was still a considerable risk of “severe tensions which will raise the odds later on,” Lee said.

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