The departing administration’s decision to push through a declaration that China is committing genocide was the latest in a series of actions that risk politicizing the issues.
The Trump administration cast its barrage of moves against Beijing, in its waning days, as necessary to stand up to China’s authoritarian leadership. Among its final acts, the administration declared that Beijing was committing genocide against Uighurs and other Muslims in a far western region. It held a video conference between a senior United States envoy and the president of Taiwan, the self-ruled island claimed by Beijing. And it jettisoned longstanding guidelines limiting exchanges with Taiwanese officials. But the decision to push through significant foreign policy measures so quickly — and during a time of turmoil in Washington — risks politicizing the issues and undermining their ability to gain global traction. While some of the decisions were in the making for months, the timing of their rollout makes them easy to dismiss. To Beijing, the moves were a last-ditch effort by the departing administration to needle China’s ruling Communist Party. And they could potentially box in President Biden by forcing him to either look weak on China by reversing the moves, or incur Beijing’s wrath. The moves were welcomed by many Taiwanese, Uighurs and other communities whom the Trump administration had said it wanted to support. But some expressed concerns that they — and their causes — were being overshadowed by geopolitics. “There are many people who suspect the legitimacy of this decision,” Tahir Imin, a Uighur activist based in Washington, said after the United States declared that China’s repression of his ethnic group amounted to genocide. “But all of the facts show clearly that what is happening is a genocide.” In the short term, the Trump administration’s moves may force the issues to the front of Mr. Biden’s China agenda, regardless of his own priorities. This complicates the new administration’s plans to maintain a combative stance on China over human rights and other issues while finding areas to cooperate and stabilize Washington’s spiraling relationship with Beijing. Beijing is likely to pressure Mr. Biden to reverse at least some of the Trump administration’s decisions as a condition of resuming talks on other issues. But reversing any decision too quickly could also send a signal to the Chinese leadership that all of the recent moves are on the table. Mr. Biden has advocated remaining tough on China. He called China’s human rights abuses in Xinjiang “genocide” during the election campaign. And Antony J. Blinken, his pick for secretary of state, said on Tuesday that he agreed with Mike Pompeo’s move in his final days in that role to declare that China’s repression of the Uighurs constituted genocide. But the Biden administration has said it will first focus on domestic priorities. There may not be bandwidth to maintain the confrontation with China that the Trump administration set in motion, targeting areas like trade, technology and security. “Because all of what has happened with the Trump administration, particularly with the last set of actions, the Chinese are going to want greater predictability,” said Bonnie S. Glaser, a senior adviser for Asia at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington.
