US sabotaging multilateralism, not exiting it: China Daily editorial

In a recent article published in the New York Post, Kelly Craft, US ambassador to the United Nations, claimed that with all its actions, the United States was not retreating from multilateralism, but preserving the multilateral system.

If that is the case, the US has an odd way of going about it.

It has withdrawn from international treaties, multiparty agreements and multilateral organizations, trod roughshod over international rules and regulations, interfered in the internal affairs of other countries, and jeopardized global trade and security.

It has also repeatedly hammered home its self-interest by imposing sanctions, and not only against countries that it is less than friendly with — Cuba, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, Iran, Syria and Venezuela — but even against its allies.

A few days ago, it issued an ultimatum to companies participating in the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline project, in a bid to scare them off. It deems the natural gas pipeline currently under construction from Russia to Germany via the Baltic Sea to be harmful to the US natural gas industry and damaging to its geopolitical interests in Eurasia.

Rather than preserving the multilateral system, the US manipulates it to maximize its interests, and when that isn't possible, it either willfully dismisses it as irrelevant or tries to sabotage it.

It ignores World Trade Organization rules — it is the perpetrator of two-thirds of the deeds that violate WTO rules, according to a report by the world trade body. And it has obstructed the selection of judges for the WTO's dispute settlement mechanism appellate body, which has rendered the mechanism almost defunct.

It also seeks to nullify any competition to its high-tech enterprises. Toshiba from Japan, Alstom from France, Ericsson from Sweden and Siemens from Germany have all suffered after attracting Washington's attention. Chinese companies such as Huawei have become the most recent targets.

To the US administration, the world is full of enemies and rivals. International rules either serve US interests or are disregarded.

Even as the need for cooperation in a host of areas — including health and the environment — becomes increasingly apparent, the US "has lost all credibility" in coordinating international cooperation, as Nobel Prize winning economist Joseph Stiglitz has said.

Rather than upholding multilateralism and behaving as a responsible member of the international community, the unilateralist policies of the current US administration have revealed the true face of the US which is that of a selfish, troublemaking bully.

As the present global health crisis and looming climate cataclysm have made acutely clear, we are all in the same predicament together. Instead of just paying lip service to multilateralism and the UN-centered international system, the US should join hands with the rest of the world.