G7 to counter China’s belt and road with infrastructure project – senior US official

The Seven Rich Nations Group will announce a new global infrastructure plan on Saturday in response to China’s Belt and Road Initiative, said a senior government official of US President Joe Biden.

The official, who spoke to reporters on condition of anonymity, said the United States would also urge other G7 leaders to “take concrete action against forced labor” in China and include criticism of Beijing in its final communiqué

“This is not just about confronting or embracing China,” the official said. “But until now we have not offered a positive alternative that reflects our values, our standards and our way of doing business.”

China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) is a multi-trillion dollar infrastructure program launched by President Xi Jinping in 2013 that includes development and investment initiatives that would stretch from Asia to Europe and beyond.

More than 100 countries have signed agreements with China to collaborate on BRI projects such as railways, ports, highways and other infrastructure.

According to a refinitive database, more than 2,600 projects with a cost of US $ 3.7 trillion were linked to the initiative in the middle of last year, although the Chinese Foreign Ministry said last June that about 20% of the projects were seriously affected by COVID the – 19 pandemic.

In March, Biden said he had proposed to British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, who hosts the three-day summit of G7 leaders in south-west England, that democratic countries develop their own rival plan. Continue reading

So far, the US official has said the West has failed to offer a positive alternative to the Chinese government’s “lack of transparency, poor environmental and labor standards and the coercive approach” that has put many countries in a worse position.

“So tomorrow we will announce ‘Build back better for the world’, an ambitious new global infrastructure initiative with our G7 partners that will not just be an alternative to B and I (Belt and Road),” said the official.

In talks, Biden will also urge other leaders to make it clear that they believe that forced labor practices are a violation of human dignity and “a tremendous example of China’s unfair economic competition” to show that they mean business with the defense of human rights.

“We are pushing to be specific in areas like Xinjiang, where there is forced labor and where we as the G7 need to express our values,” the official said of the final communiqué to be released at the end of the summit on Sunday.

There were no details of how the global infrastructure program was funded. The plan calls for hundreds of billions of public and private funds to be raised to fill a $ 40 trillion infrastructure gap in needy countries by 2035, the official said

The aim was to work with Congress to complement existing development finance, “in the hope that, together with G7 partners, the private sector and other stakeholders, we will jointly catalyze hundreds of billions of dollars in infrastructure investments for low and middle income countries, who need them “. “.

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