China is not US' 'new global enemy'

JUST a few days after US President Donald Trump agreed to a shaky trade truce with Chinese President Xi Jinping during a meeting in Argentina, the US Justice Department requested last week that the Canadian government arrest Huawei Technologies chief financial officer Meng Wenzhou in Vancouver, and extradite her to the US, charging her company with violating American economic sanctions on Iran and lying about it.

On the face of it, it seemed that by asking the Canadians to apprehend the CFO of the world's largest telecom manufacturer (who also happens to be the daughter of its founder, Ren Zhengfei) one of the agencies of the US federal government was trying to undermine the policies being pursued by the president.

Moreover, the move - which was bound to escalate tensions with China, and could possibly wreck the trade cease-fire reached in Buenos Aires - ran contrary to the Trumpist narrative, according to which President Trump has not been able to advance his economic nationalist agenda, including his anti-China policies, because of opposition from the satellites of the so-called "deep state" - the US Justice Department being one of them.