A weekend of summits: G7 ramps up pressure on China while Xi unveils big plans for Central Asia

The Group of Seven (G7) leaders gave their strongest condemnation of China to date during their summit in the Japanese city of Hiroshima on May 19–21.

The leaders of the world’s most advanced economies pledged to step up their efforts to counter Beijing’s “economic coercion” and growing presence in the East and South China Seas, while also raising concern over Taiwan, nuclear arms, and human rights abuses.

The group “stand[s] prepared to build constructive and stable relations” with Beijing, but stressed the importance of “engaging candidly…and expressing our concerns directly to China,” according to the joint communiqué. The communiqué, along with other statements released from the summit, also repeatedly emphasized “de-risking, not decoupling” with China — a nod to the EU’s approach to Beijing and a sign of growing consensus between the G7 heavyweights, the U.S. and the EU.

The G7 summit is an annual gathering of the leaders of seven advanced economies: the U.S., Japan, the U.K., France, Germany, Italy, Canada, and the European Union (EU). This year, however, a spate of guest leaders from Australia, India, Indonesia, South Korea, and Vietnam were also invited, in an apparent push to court mainly emerging economies.

But the surprise appearance by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy took the spotlight as an attempt to rally support for Kyiv — especially given that Russia was kicked out of the group in 2014 following its illegal occupation of Crimea. Zelenskyy’s in-person visit was considered a rare opportunity to appeal to non-G7 leaders, such as Brazil and India, both of which have maintained ties with Russia despite its war in Ukraine.

Beijing responded with démarches and strong words: China’s Foreign Ministry said it firmly opposed the statement by the G7 on Sunday, saying that the meeting was an attempt to “smear and attack China” and “brazenly interfere in China’s internal affairs.” Beijing also summoned Japan’s ambassador to China to protest the summit’s host, and criticized the U.K. in response to British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s remarks calling China “the biggest challenge of our age to global security and prosperity” after the summit.

While G7 was in Japan, Xi was courting Central Asia

While the G7 leaders and their counterparts from guest nations gathered in Hiroshima on Friday, Chinese leader Xí Jìnpíng 习近平 unveiled a grand development plan to wrap up his chairing of the China-Central Asia Summit in Xi’an, the capital city of Shaanxi Province.

In his first in-person summit with the leaders of Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan, Xi vowed to increase transport and energy ties with the region. The location was a symbolic one: Xi’an is commonly known as the eastern starting point of the ancient Silk Road, and a marker of connectivity between China and Rome through Central Asia that facilitated the exchange of wealth and culture across the continent.

For Beijing, Central Asia is an important component to its Belt and Road Initiative through its vast energy imports and lucrative transport corridors to Europe. The region is also critical for China to ensure security of Xinjiang, home to the Uyghurs.

China has long offered itself as an alternative source of funding for developing countries to build up their economies, particularly in the Global South and in Central Asia. The backdrop of the G7 summit, with many guest leaders from emerging economies present, comes as the group tries to counter China’s growing economic influence in developing nations: Many of the Belt and Road deals have been marketed by Beijing as ones that come with “no strings attached.”

“We never impose our thinking onto others, nor do we slip into the initiative any selfish geopolitical agenda,” Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Máo Níng 毛宁 said today when asked about President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen’s recent criticisms at the G7 summit on China’s Belt and Road loans.

“We can’t help but ask what the G7, as the wealthiest countries in the world, has visibly contributed to the well-being of developing countries,” Mao Ning added.

But beneath Xi’s promises of greater connectivity in Central Asia, tensions are simmering on the ground. Many of Beijing’s relations with its Central Asian neighbors today are complicated, and some of its efforts have been met with local resistance. In Kazakhstan, there have been 156 anti-Chinese protests reported in the country since 2018, with many of the protesters voicing discontent about China’s growing economic and political influence. Those concerns are playing out in the country’s history classrooms, where both students and teachers are left with more questions than answers about their very powerful neighbor.

Meanwhile, some observers have questioned if China will soon take Russia’s long-standing place as the security guarantor of choice for Central Asia. But that probably will not happen anytime soon.