Ambassador Qin Gang's interview with US mainstream media

Iain Marlow (Bloomberg): I was actually previously based in Hong Kong until Christmas, and I saw some of my Bloomberg colleagues this morning saying that banks in Hong Kong are now offering hardship money to people to encourage them to move to Hong Kong, because no one wants to come anymore, because of zero-Covid policies. And I was wondering if you could describe a little bit about your vision or how long these measures are gonna be in place. And I'm not talking just about Hong Kong, but in China. We've seen Condoleezza Rice at the Aspen Forum sort of mock the zero-Covid policy and, in terms of it, beginning to hit at China's political reputation, saying that no one wants to replicate China anymore because of these sorts of restrictions that you put on people. I'm wondering if you could give a sense of how long you see these measures being in place and whether you view them as having any negative impact on China's standing in the world or China's integration with other countries, whether that's in Asia or across the world?

Ambassador Qin Gang: I don't understand for what reason Condoleezza Rice mocked China's approach to tackle Covid. This country has the world record of the highest number of infections, the highest number of deaths. Why she mocked China? Given China's size and population, our work on Covid has been successful and great. You're seeing the number of deaths and infections which are pretty small and seeing that China's economy coming back, experiencing very strong recovery. This is because China puts people in the center of its governance, and the Communist Party of China implements its mission, which is to serve the people wholeheartedly during their efforts to confront Covid. We call our approach as the "dynamic zero-Covid" policy. It's dynamic and it's not rigid. We readjust our policy according to circumstances, particularly the degree of the spread of Covid. It protected people, it protected China's economy, and it protected the global supply and industrial chains. If China suffers severely from Covid, think about the consequences. China is still manufacturing and providing a variety of products to countries around the world, including the United States, at this difficult time.  Of course like in all the countries, Covid has caused great difficulties to traveling and to people's lives. It's understandable. China is no exception. So we hope that the situation of Covid will get relaxed sooner, so that people can enjoy their normal life, economic activities can be brought back and traveling can be restored, which is so important at this moment, because we have tensions between our two countries and we need more interactions, so that people can have correct mutual understanding.

Evan Osnos (The New Yorker): Can I have a question of the Taiwan issue again, about the timeline? President Xi Jinping has said this is not an issue that we passed from generation to generation. I'm curious if the events of the last year or two, the conditions in the US-China relationship or more broadly in the world have accelerated that timeline in any way? There was a report recently that some in the US assessed that it may have accelerated China's timeline for reunification. I'm curious if that's the fact.

Ambassador Qin Gang: I don't know if there is any specific time, but I do know there is a will. There's a prospect for peace reunification. There's a will of more than 1.4 billion Chinese people for reunification. As what we said in the just published White Paper on the question of Taiwan, the question of Taiwan was caused because of a weak and chaotic China, and must be resolved in the course of national rejuvenation. This is a prospect. And I don't know if there is a timeline. I think that people are over-nervous about it. And there are lots of speculations on that, which I have found baseless.

Evan Osnos: I have to follow up just briefly on that. In the event of reunification, how does China anticipate the international reaction to unfold? You expect that the international community would embrace this development or reject this development? And are you prepared to handle the consequences?

Ambassador Qin Gang: You mean the consequences for what?

Evan Osnos: If for instance, the rest of the world isolating China or international businesses respond by withdrawing there?

Ambassador Qin Gang: Why they want to isolate China?

Josh Rogin: If you attack them.

Ambassador Qin Gang: There's no such a presumption. In the first place, Taiwan is a part of China. The question of Taiwan is a purely internal affair of China, which brooks no foreign intervention. Secondly, as I mentioned earlier, the mainland will pay the utmost efforts in great sincerity to achieve peaceful reunification. they use non-peaceful means only under the circumstances that Taiwan declares independence by a handful of separatist forces and the intervention of foreign forces. Whatever happens, this is purely an internal affair. You mentioned the international community. Let me say this, there are 181 countries having diplomatic relations with China based on the one-China principle. The overwhelming majority of the international community are supportive and accept the one-China policy. On Nancy Pelosi's visit to Taiwan, more than 170 countries (and international organizations) have voiced support for the one-China principle. They take 80% of global population. China has followed international law and basic norms governing international relations. Why countries criticize or isolate China because of an internal affair of China? So I didn't find any legal and practical basis for that.