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Telesur English presents a new episode of “China Now”, a wave media's production that showcases the culture, technology, and politics of the Asian Giant.
China Now is a show that explores the past and future of the Asian Giant.
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NewsTranscript
00:00Hello, Telesur English presents a new episode of China Now, a webmedia production that showcases
00:14the culture, technology and politics of the Asian giant.
00:16In this first segment, Corinne dives into the top stories of the week, including a lawsuit
00:20lost by the Pentagon to a Chinese company and the increased investment of German auto
00:25market in China, among other topics, let's see.
00:44Welcome to China Current, your weekly news report on what's happening in China.
00:49I'm Lisa.
00:50In this episode, the Pentagon lost a lawsuit to a Chinese company.
00:55The US Navy encountered Chinese vessels on Pacific patrol.
00:59Chinese warship exercised their right to freedom of navigation in the English Channel.
01:04A Japanese veteran from Unit 731 came to China to offer an apology.
01:10German automakers are increasing their investment in China, despite opposition from the government.
01:16First, let's focus on a lawsuit.
01:19On the 12th of August, the Pentagon backed down in the face of legal action from a Chinese
01:24company, Hesai Technology, which specialized in producing LiDAR, a crucial component for
01:31self-driving cars.
01:33It is headquartered in Shanghai and listed on NASDAQ.
01:37In January of this year, the US Department of Defense added Hesai Technology, along with
01:4345 other Chinese companies, to its blacklist, labeling them as Chinese military companies,
01:51which means Hesai was accused by the US government for being owned or cooperating with the Chinese
01:57military, restricting American investors from buying its shares.
02:03In response, Hesai Technology filed a lawsuit against the Pentagon in May.
02:08The company argued that there was no evidence linking it to China's military, and called
02:14the Pentagon's decision to be arbitrary and capricious.
02:18Hesai has requested a federal court in Washington to issue a summary judgment, with a hearing
02:24scheduled in September.
02:27According to a report from the Financial Times, the US government lawyers were concerned that
02:32the justification for blacklisting Hesai wouldn't withstand legal scrutiny under 2021 legislation.
02:41Simply saying, Hesai was affiliated and engaged in research partnership with the Chinese Ministry
02:47of Industry and Information Technology wasn't enough to meet the legal requirements.
02:53Hesai responded that the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology was akin to a US
02:59regulatory agency.
03:01In fact, the department is mainly responsible for implementing policies in the fields such
03:06as postal service, internet, wireless, broadcasting, etc.
03:12If the Pentagon identified this department as a military office, they will need to similarly
03:17classify the Department of Commerce to be consistent.
03:21In the light of these concerns, the Pentagon has now decided to remove Hesai from its blacklist,
03:27acknowledging that it does not meet the legal criteria for inclusion.
03:31The Biden administration has consistently scrutinized the data security of Chinese high-tech
03:37products.
03:38However, Hesai has maintained that its products are strictly for commercial and civilian use.
03:45A claim supported by its partnership with US technology giants, notably ZooX, an autonomous
03:52robot taxi company acquired by Amazon for over US$1 billion, has a publicly known partnership
03:59with Hesai.
04:01A new Forbes legal survey revealed that 93% of Americans have concerns about self-driving
04:07cars, particularly with regards to safety.
04:11Lighters, which use laser beams to measure the distance of objects around vehicles, can
04:17significantly provide more safety protection for pedestrians and drivers than pure vision
04:22sensor solutions.
04:24It was dismissed by Elon Musk in 2019 because of the high cost of production.
04:30But now, with the considerable needs generated by Chinese EV makers, the rapid expansion
04:35of the lighter industry has greatly spread the research and development cost.
04:40The price of lighter sensors have dropped from thousands of dollars over the past few
04:45years to several hundred dollars.
04:47According to industry research firm Euler Group, more than 70% of the world's automakers
04:53are now choosing to collaborate with Hesai in developing self-driving cars.
04:59Among the world's eight major robot taxi companies, four are from the United States,
05:04including Tesla, GM, Ford, and AutoX, all of which have partnered with Hesai in manufacturing
05:10or R&D.
05:12The global robot taxi market is projected to reach $45 billion by 2030, offering significant
05:19opportunities for American investors.
05:22However, the Pentagon's previous blacklisting of Hesai created risk for companies and its
05:28even threatening to deter American investments.
05:31The Financial Times pointed out it is an embarrassing setback for the US government.
05:36But in fact, it is not the first time that the US government has faced such a situation.
05:42In 2021, the Pentagon similarly removed Chinese smartphone maker Xiaomi from its blacklist
05:48after Xiaomi sued, arguing the blacklisting was unconstitutional.
05:53In other related developments, the Biden administration recently decided to delay the
05:58increased tariff on Chinese imports, originally set for August 1, has further underscored
06:04concern about the impact on American businesses.
06:08The delay had been met with positive reaction from China, with the Chinese embassy in Washington
06:13stating they are pleased to see U.S. correcting discriminatory practice and providing a fair,
06:19just and non-discriminatory business environment for Chinese companies.
06:24The news outlet Global Times said the delay indicated the irreplaceability of Chinese
06:30technologies.
06:31However, the American intelligence expert James Mullivan cautioned that Congress may
06:36soon update the 2021 law, potentially allowing the Pentagon to re-blacklist Hesai.
06:43While in Germany, when a government has taken a less-than-friendly stance towards China,
06:49companies have consistently made more rational business decisions.
06:53According to a Financial Times report on the 13th of August, despite calls for caution
06:59from the German government regarding investment in China, German capital had been flowing
07:05into the country at a record-breaking pace.
07:09This year, investment has surged beyond all expectations, exceeding the total of previous
07:14years in just the first half alone.
07:17Data from the German Central Bank paints a stark picture of this economic trend.
07:23German direct investment in China skyrocketed to US$2.71 billion in the first quarter of
07:30the year, the figure nearly doubled to a remarkable US$5.25 billion in the second quarter.
07:38The staggering growth resulted in a cumulative investment of approximately US$8.96 billion
07:45for the first half of this year, significantly exceeding the total investment for the entire
07:51previous year.
07:52Just a year ago, the Shor's administration urged caution in trading relations with China,
07:59emphasising the need to mitigate risk by diversifying supply chains.
08:04Despite these governmental concerns about geopolitical uncertainties, German automotive
08:09giants remain undeterred, leading in the charge in investing in China.
08:15Analysts like Daniel Rose from Rhodium Group predict this fervent investment trend will
08:20continue throughout the year.
08:22Moving on, in a story reported by Newsweek on 12th of August, it has come to light that
08:28a US Navy destroyer, USS Rafale Peralta, had a close encounter with Chinese naval ships
08:35while on patrol in the Western Pacific last month.
08:39What's interesting is that the Peralta's official page on Facebook said it protected
08:44Guam during Chinese and Russian deployments in the area, but later the reference was quietly
08:50deleted.
08:51The USS Rafale Peralta, one of the nine Ali-Rouge-class destroyers based in Japan, is part of the
08:587th Fleet, principal service force in Western Pacific and Indian Oceans.
09:04This encounter followed a significant two-week joint naval patrol by China and Russia.
09:10While neither nation disclosed a precise route, they hinted that it covered parts of the Western
09:15and Northern Pacific Ocean, stretching over 4,800 nautical miles, suggesting that their
09:22fleet may have ventured close to Guam.
09:25Commander Megan Green, a spokesperson for the US 7th Fleet, has previously emphasised
09:35Guam's crucial role in maintaining American influence in the Western Pacific.
09:40The island houses three major military bases, air forces, navy and marine corps, and sits
09:47just 1,500 to 1,700 miles from Taiwan Island.
09:53Guam's strategic significance has been evidenced throughout history, particularly
09:58during the first Taiwan Strait crisis in the 1950s.
10:02President Dwight Eisenhower deployed the 7th Fleet to the region, intervening in China's
10:07internal affairs.
10:09Since then, to interfere with the reunification of mainland China and Taiwan, the 7th Fleet's
10:15aircraft carriers have twice sailed through the Taiwan Strait.
10:19Washington refers to these actions as routine freedom-of-navigation operations, demonstrating
10:25American power in the region.
10:27But regarding the encounter between the Chinese and US Navy last month, Megan Green said China
10:33and Russia are authorised in accordance with customary international law and conduct operations
10:39in international airspace and international waters.
10:43She also stated the encounter was safe and professional.
10:48On a similar note, let's turn to the British Royal Navy.
10:52On the 10th of August, two Chinese warships traversed the English Channel for the second
10:57time in just three weeks.
10:59UK Armed Forces Minister Luke Pollard emphasised that the Royal Navy closely monitored the
11:06situation, ensuring the US remained, in his words, secure at home and strong aboard.
11:12However, Indian media outlet the Eurasian Times highlighted a significant disparity,
11:18noting that while Chinese warships flexed their muscles in the English Channels, the
11:23UK could only deploy a ship on the verge of retirement.
11:27The ship was in fact the HMS Richmond, a 4,000-ton frigate that has been in service for nearly
11:3430 years.
11:36In contrast, the two Chinese warships, exceeding 30,000 tons totally, had been in service for
11:42less than a decade.
11:43This raised questions about the UK's military capability.
11:47It is not the first time the HMS Richmond has encountered the Chinese Navy.
11:52Back in 2021, the same vessel navigated in the Taiwan Strait, a move profoundly displayed
11:58by the British Navy on social media.
12:01Now just three years later, the ships met once again in the English Channel.
12:06Next up, a Japanese veteran has found the courage to stand up and acknowledge the war
12:11crimes committed by Unit 731.
12:14On 13 August, Shimizu Hideo, a former member of Japanese Biological Warfare Unit 731, went
12:22to China to express his apology.
12:25He was conscripted in the Unit 731 at the age of 14 in 1945, and remained there until
12:32Japan's unconditional surrender a few months later.
12:36On his return to Japan, Shimizu was instructed to keep his involvement with the Unit 731
12:43a secret.
12:44During his recent visit, Shimizu visited the former site of Unit 731 in Harbin.
12:51It is now an expedition hall displaying evidence of the war crimes committed by the unit.
12:56He recalled witnessing various specimens such as pregnant women and babies soaked in formalin.
13:02Shimizu bowed multiple times in front of a monument, expressing his deepest condolences
13:08to the victims.
13:09At the site, he offered a sincere apology and repentance to the Chinese people.
13:15According to Nanjing Daily, Unit 731 was responsible for the murders of over 200,000 Chinese civilians.
13:23According to Hackerton International, an American journal of medical, at least 300,000 people
13:30died of infectious disease resulting from the work of Unit 731 and its associated laboratories.
13:37Apart from China, the victims were from countries including Russia, Korea, the Philippines,
13:42and Indonesia.
13:43While individuals like Shimizu are actively seeking to apologize for Japanese war crime
13:49atrocities, the nation's leader continues to face criticism for his reluctance to fully
13:54acknowledge the past.
13:56On the 15th of August, Japan's Prime Minister, Fumio Kishida, included a symbolic donation
14:02to the Yasukuni Shrine, reignited debates about Japan's accountability for its war
14:08crime actions.
14:09This shrine honors numerous Japanese war criminals from World War II, including figures like
14:14Ezoroku Yamamoto, the Japanese officer who commanded the attack on Pearl Harbor, and
14:20Masaharu Homma, responsible for the massacre of 30,000 American prisoners of war in the
14:26Philippines.
14:27And that is all for today.
14:28Thank you for watching this episode of China Current.
14:31If you have any thoughts or comments about our show, please reach us at the email address
14:35below.
14:36We look forward to hearing from you, and see you next time.
14:47We have a short break, but we'll be right back.
14:48Stay with us.
14:57Welcome back to China Now.
15:09This week, the Thinkers Forum welcomes Cambodian Professor Keith-Ray Dechem and Buljana Vankoska
15:16from Northern Macedonia to discuss the challenges of the present world.
15:20Let's see.
15:22First, I'd like to thank China Academy for giving me the chance to talk at your studio
15:31today.
15:32My name is Chem Kiat-Reti.
15:35I'm a Professor of Technology and Humanities from Camtec University from Cambodia.
15:46That's a very good question about the Belt and Road Initiative because, personally,
15:49I was involved also as a policy researcher for the last 10 years.
15:54First, Cambodia being a developing country, we need to develop our infrastructures, road,
16:00highway, bridge, port, airport, etc.
16:03So with the support, with the funding from the loan from the Belt and Road Initiative,
16:09Cambodia was able, for example, to build a road from the capital Phnom Penh to the port
16:16Sihanoukville, and then that reduced the time of transportation from five to six hours
16:22to only less than two hours.
16:24So this is a very big logistic achievement for the Cambodian government.
16:31On the other hand, also, there's a lot of other collaboration.
16:35Particularly, I'd like to probably share an example about people-to-people connectivity
16:42because this year is a special year of the Belt and Road Initiative that focuses on people-to-people.
16:48For example, yesterday, here, I organized a dinner for three Cambodian students
16:55who got a scholarship from the government of China.
16:58I have been told, and I was very pleased to hear, that just in Beijing,
17:02there are more than 300 Cambodian students doing a Master or PhD in China.
17:08And overall, in other provinces, many other places in China,
17:13I believe that there are more than 1,000 Cambodians who studied in China.
17:17Today's students will become leaders in the future, 10 to 20 years.
17:22They become leaders in the government, in the private sector, in academia.
17:27They have studied in China, so during their study here, they learn about China,
17:32better knowledge of China.
17:34They have professors, they have friends.
17:36So, I believe that in the future, the relationship between China and Cambodia will be even stronger
17:43because they have built a bonding during their stay here in Beijing
17:48and anywhere else in China for two, three, four, five years.
17:57I believe that in the current situation, Western media misunderstand China.
18:03Worse, most of them, they don't know about China.
18:06They heard, they write about China without visiting China.
18:09So, I think the one way to educate the public, particularly in the Western world,
18:15to know about China's civilization is to promote the image of China through different media,
18:21like you did today, and also open up the visa system to allow people to come.
18:26You understand the fear of the people of the media.
18:30They don't know about China.
18:31But China has 4,000 years of history, 1.4 billion.
18:36When China rises, I think a lot of people are afraid of that.
18:40So, it also falls in the responsibility of China to promote that image as a pacific rise of China.
18:50So, better communication, more effective communication,
18:55and engagement with people who have no knowledge about China,
19:01but tend to judge without much evidence.
19:04So, overall, it's a matter of branding China with a positive image.
19:09But, you know, I travel with China over the last 15 years.
19:11I see so much progress.
19:13Your infrastructure is amazing.
19:15There are no countries that can do this kind of progress in such a short time.
19:19Socially, China's economy rises.
19:22Your government lifted 800 million people out of poverty.
19:26That's quite an achievement for humankind.
19:28It never happened in history.
19:30So, you have a beautiful story to tell the rest of the world.
19:34It's about telling a good story and engagement with the rest of the world.
19:38To me, China has such a beautiful civilization.
19:41Technology is advancing.
19:43To make sure that people are not worried about the rights of China
19:48is to communicate in the most effective way.
19:51I come to China the last 15 years.
19:54I come like 20, 25 times, so I know what is China.
19:57But most people, they don't know.
19:59And also, they believe all the bad images that are fabricated by Western media.
20:05I believe that it's up to China to try to find a way to promote more visitors to China
20:12and wish you all the success.
20:19So, if you look at the interaction between Cambodia and China,
20:25Cambodian people and Chinese people,
20:28it's a very long story.
20:30So, about 1,500 years ago,
20:32the king of ancient Cambodia sent Buddhist monks to China
20:37to translate Buddhist sutras from Sanskrit to Chinese.
20:42Also, on the other way around,
20:45the emperor of China sent monks or doctors to learn herbal medicine in Cambodia.
20:51Also, in Cambodia, there are many, many Chinese
20:55who migrated to Cambodia for a thousand years.
21:00And in Cambodia, many Cambodians are descended from Chinese ancestors.
21:06Myself, my current name is Cambodian,
21:09but actually, my initial name is Lee.
21:12My great-grandfather came from Fujian province.
21:15So, with all this connection,
21:17if you go to Cambodia, you will meet a lot of Chinese overseas who decide to settle there.
21:23So, there's a mixture of values that we use in our daily life.
21:30Buddhism and Confucianism all mix together
21:34and that would guide our life,
21:36try to be prosperous,
21:38try to cultivate a society that is harmonious and prosperous.
21:49So, the talk I delivered this morning at the Aristotle Confucius Symposium
21:55was about compassionate AI.
21:58So, it's how to design artificial intelligence systems that have some compassion.
22:04It's very challenging.
22:06How far can we go with that?
22:08The future will tell us.
22:10But most definitely, if you look at the current AI system,
22:15they have no consciousness, no emotion, no even morality.
22:22So, how can we prevent a kind of wild development of technology, of AI in the future
22:28that breaks all the rules of morality?
22:32As designers of AI systems, engineers, scientists, philosophers, we have a role.
22:37We make sure that when we design a system,
22:40when we write programs, we write algorithms,
22:43all the elements of good morality, benevolence is embedded in the system.
22:50But this has been said, sometimes still,
22:53we need to monitor to make sure that the algorithm program that we have written
22:59for the AI system follows the rules that we have included
23:03to make sure that whatever they do in terms of action in the future,
23:08the system is benevolent and will not cause any harm to the users of AI.
23:15I use compassionate AI as a provocative title,
23:19but we cannot expect AI, a system, a technological system, that can be compassionate.
23:28Can AI be morally responsible?
23:32Definitely not, at least for now.
23:35So, who is responsible then?
23:37The human agent.
23:39So, the person who designed the AI program,
23:43the person who deployed the AI system,
23:47and the users have to be aware that when they use AI, they use it wisely.
23:52You're talking about competition between the US and China.
23:57This is a geopolitical question.
24:00The US has been dominant for a long time, but China is on the rise.
24:05If you compare the US to China, the US is 200 years old,
24:11China has 4,000 years of civilization.
24:15So, if China survived 4,000 years already,
24:20they will be here for the next 4,000 years.
24:23So, what we expect is that both China and the US
24:28should recognize its mutual strengths and weaknesses
24:33and work together for the benefit of the other people who live on this planet.
24:38This rivalry is very negative,
24:41it carries the risk of a major conflict,
24:44and we should avoid that.
24:46And building peace means understanding each other.
24:50And this symposium, Aristotle, Confucius, and also Buddha,
24:57is a wonderful platform and opportunity for science diplomacy.
25:04How, for example, in particular, AI can be developed together
25:09for global common good.
25:12Intelligent technology, particularly AI, is a dual technology.
25:17It means that it can do good, but it can do bad also.
25:22Similar to nuclear technology in the 20th century,
25:27you can use nuclear technology to kill cancer cells to cure cancer.
25:33Or, like some countries, they build atomic bombs to drop and to kill civilians.
25:40So, there is a strong need for a global governance of AI in the near future,
25:48and all countries should discuss together.
25:51I heard also that China, the government of China,
25:55has launched a diplomatic initiative called Global Data Security Initiative.
26:02And this is one big step to look at how we can monitor,
26:08control the use of data for pacific use.
26:12And in order for this kind of diplomatic initiative to be successful,
26:17there will be needed a strong commitment from all countries,
26:22and particularly to come around the table to negotiate
26:26for the best interests of the people living on our planet.
26:30The Ukraine-Russian war is actually something that many peace researchers
26:37and even people out of academia could easily predict
26:42and warned about the future developments.
26:46But sadly, few people in power centers listen to scholars
26:52or intellectuals or peace activists.
26:55The power centers actually already had the idea to escalate the situation
27:02and they were not working for peace.
27:05And the whole story, narrative about NATO enlargement being a process
27:13of spreading Western democracy, values, peace, etc. was false, of course.
27:22Because on the background, we can find many indications
27:28that this situation had been prepared.
27:32So in 2014, when Euromaidan took place, that was a colored revolution, of course.
27:41But few observers or analysts would notice that right after
27:48the Ukrainian colored revolution, the next one was Macedonia.
27:53My country is a part of former Yugoslavia, but the way to NATO and EU integrations
28:01was obstructed by our southern neighbor, Greece,
28:06who objected the name of the country, Macedonia.
28:09So due to this problem, which is very emotional and very important for the people,
28:16because we have no other reserved identity but being what we are
28:21and we consider ourselves Macedonians.
28:24Many governments didn't even try to really change the name
28:29or do something radical in this sense.
28:34So the colored revolution actually helped remove the previous government
28:40that was stubborn, that didn't want to follow the guidelines from the West.
28:46And West got nervous, actually, and didn't want this small, tiny little country
28:54to spoil their grand strategy.
28:57Macedonia is not important per se.
29:00It's a very small territory, just two million people,
29:04but it makes a problem in the entire Balkan puzzle.
29:09So let me remind us that in 2005, almost two decades ago,
29:16it was the former US State Secretary John Kerry who said that Macedonia,
29:22Serbia and these countries in the so-called Western Balkans are on the front line,
29:28meaning front line of a future conflict, which means that they had it in the cards.
29:34Everything is interlinked.
29:36What happened in Ukraine is followed in Macedonia.
29:40Macedonia got into NATO and that is presented as some kind of achievement,
29:45some kind of contribution of the government that finally made this dream,
29:51strategic goal achieved for the people.
29:56Sadly, Ukraine paid a much higher price than Macedonia.
30:00We paid without losing our sovereignty, our constitutional identity, our history.
30:08So this identity package is what we sacrificed on the altar of NATO membership.
30:14While Ukrainians are suffering really in terms of human loss, destruction and all that.
30:21Everything could have been avoided, of course.
30:24I oppose NATO not only in my country, Macedonia, but also in the entire region of former Yugoslavia.
30:32It is because of an obvious reason.
30:35If you have a region that suffered from terrible turmoil, bloody conflicts,
30:43and the consequences are still here, we still remember that it is still so fresh and painful for the societies.
30:52There is still no reconciliation.
30:54Young people are leaving.
30:56Brain drain is massive.
30:59And people want to live a decent life.
31:03Why on earth military alliance?
31:06The problem with NATO is that NATO is unable and actually never promised
31:12to resolve the existential, social, economic, political, interethnic or societal problems of these societies.
31:20So getting in alliance was promised here as some kind of miracle, some magic,
31:31that once we are in NATO, we are safe, we are going to be rich, everything will be perfect.
31:38So it was a fairytale story for little children, not for adults.
31:43Now, when we are part of NATO, the irony is that we are a warring party in a proxy war.
31:50Macedonia is a poor country, and sadly, it belongs to 18 countries that are members of NATO
31:58who invest more than 2% of their GDP for military budget,
32:04not only for the membership fee to NATO, but also modernization of the army.
32:12And now military support for Ukraine.
32:15So we are investing from our poverty supporting war, not peace.
32:20We, the people who know what war really means, are now joining a military crusade
32:28and actually we are on the wrong side of history.
32:31We are in a worse situation than before.
32:34We are currently on the list of non-friendly countries of Russia.
32:40Why? Why should Macedonia, a small country, or even a bigger country, make enemies?
32:47Instead of making friendships, we are making enemies.
32:51And in a case of a nuclear holocaust or whatever, we are really on this front line.
32:59Due to the part that Yugoslavia fell apart, Macedonia is a poor, tiny country
33:06with no statehood experience and traditions.
33:10It really found itself in a very hard situation.
33:14There was a narrative against our own historical traditions and identities
33:21saying that we need to be part of the West, that we are the West.
33:27But somehow during the communist times, we were not allowed
33:32or we were part of a different interest sphere or whatever.
33:36The problem is that the Balkans is on a geographic position
33:41where civilizations have been meeting each other, crossing each other, influencing each other.
33:49So we cannot be just the West.
33:52We are also the East or we have something of our own to offer the world.
33:58Nevertheless, the NATO and EU strategic goals have been highest on the top agenda of the political elites.
34:08Elites who were incapable, corrupted, or were unable to provide for the people,
34:16to cover the basic human needs, to establish the normal, decent state and everything else.
34:24So this is like a religion.
34:27Let's believe this, not question it.
34:30This is the TINA principle.
34:33There is no alternative to NATO, to EU, to capitalism, open market, political liberalism.
34:43But then it was easy to adopt a new constitution and to make it copy-paste from the Western constitutions
34:51and to adopt some kind of parliamentary democracy.
34:55But it could not work in reality because the elections are a farce,
35:01the political elites are making love with the people,
35:05but they are always loyal to the international community, meaning the West.
35:11So in a region devastated by wars and conflicts,
35:17the Western powers came under the cloak of international community.
35:24They took over that name, not rightly so, of course, because they never represented the entire world.
35:32And they promoted themselves into peace builders and state builders.
35:37We practically, with the end of history, you know, the Fukuyama's famous phrase,
35:46we did not only lose our traditions and our past, but we also lost our agency, our right,
35:55our right for political self-determination or any other type of deciding of our own future.
36:04We were treated as infantile societies that should be taught some elementary things.
36:11We are just fooling ourselves that we are living in democracy, that we are deciding on something.
36:18This is a region, sadly, where all the countries allegedly independent are actually colonies.
36:27There is a neo-colonialism at play here.
36:32They would never take responsibility for the consequences.
36:37And we are the ones, the locals, who live with their consequences, with the consequences of their medicines.
36:43Western medicines give, produce the atrogenetic effects, which means they make the patient more sick than before.
36:56We spoke about the foreign policy.
36:59I just cannot imagine that Macedonian elites simply deleted from their memory the fact that Yugoslavia
37:09was one of the major respected foreign policy players in a very critical period of time during the Cold War.
37:18So it was possible.
37:20There was a high quality diplomacy, knowledge about the world in its totality.
37:27I remember the time when I was proud of my country.
37:32That is something, you know, to be proud of being Yugoslav or Macedonian.
37:38And these two were not in contradiction.
37:40You could be both, you know, at the same time.
37:43You know, it took me a while to understand that when we talk about solving the problems in our society,
37:52so wider in the region, let alone globally, we face a very powerful complex.
38:00And that is the military-industrial-media-academia complex.
38:07Some colleagues mentioned even entertainment industry as something that made people distracted from reality.
38:17Indulging some other games or whatever, just not to face what is really happening.
38:25The real diagnosis and the root problem here is that for the last more than three decades,
38:34as we are allegedly independent states,
38:37the Western power centers actually designed the minds of the elites, who are, as I said, loyal.
38:47They taught them, you know, to talk with their language, their rhetoric, to behave in that way.
38:55And then that spread into the media, who are not professional or objective.
39:01They are financed by the Western funds.
39:03We never heard here anything about China, about development, technological, cultural.
39:11Now we are seeing on Olympic Games how far has China's sport gone with a lot of successes and all that.
39:20And not only China, of course, but there is a world around, not only the West.
39:26But these political elites joined with the media elites.
39:31And unfortunately, my colleagues from the academia, they are all together, they are brown sahibs.
39:40They are, you know, part of this colonial history, where the colonial power would need local people to manage things, to administer territories.
39:54So these brown sahibs actually want to be Westerners, even if they are not.
40:01So this goes generation by generation.
40:06A country that is not allowed to have its eternal sovereign home policy, it doesn't have foreign policy at all.
40:14I argue and I can prove that a country like mine and Montenegro and Bosnia-Herzegovina or even Croatia that is part of NATO and EU,
40:28they even think that they don't need a foreign policy because somebody else decides on the main roads of where we are going, where to invest, where to fight, whom to fight, who is the enemy, who is the friend.
40:43So the foreign policy is something that is a luxury, unfortunately, that we don't have.
40:50That is a brutal truth.
40:53The decline of the West is nothing new.
40:56It is a long term process.
40:58It was maybe 20 years ago.
41:01We were talking about that as a prediction that something is going to happen with this society because it is not sustainable.
41:11It is based on violent culture.
41:13We can see that now in the elections.
41:17I mean, this looks like anything but democratic elections.
41:22Not to talk about growing social inequalities, poverty, homeless people on the streets, decadence in political and cultural sphere.
41:35So now they are going downhills.
41:38Not now, but for a long time.
41:41My only concern is that when empires in the past would come to an end, it would cost a lot of human lives.
41:50And that is what I'm not concerned about the future of the United States.
41:55It is a concern of their citizens.
41:58But I'm concerned because of my safety and my security and of my people depends on the president of the United States more than of the president of my country.
42:10Because the impact of the American policy, as I mentioned, NATO is just a facade for American imperialist marching.
42:20NATO is growing into global NATO.
42:23They want to swallow the United Nations system.
42:27This is a madness.
42:29And of course, the price will be paid by ordinary people, by simple people, by a small country or bigger countries.
42:37Nevertheless, we will be all collateral damage of the fall of the empire.
42:45And this was another episode of China Now, a show that opens a window to the present and the future of the ASEAN.
42:51Hope you enjoyed it. See you next time.