Diplomatic Decoupling With China
Commentary
Since at least Fall 2020, American diplomats in China have quietly suffered. So have their families. Using the excuse of the pandemic, the regime in Beijing imprisoned as many as 30 diplomats and family members “in locked rooms and often squalid conditions,” according to The Wall Street Journal.
“These people and other arriving diplomats have also been subject to multiple and unnecessary medical tests; forced to undergo months of quarantine and family separation; and they are monitored and controlled by China’s online ‘health’ app,” according to the Journal’s editorial board.
This abuse violates U.S. policies against using the pandemic to mistreat diplomats. A July 2020 State Department policy banned U.S. diplomatic travel to countries that forced COVID-19 testing of diplomats and families by foreigners or quarantined them in foreign government facilities….