China At UNGA81 Rejects Bloc Confrontation, Unilateral Force And Protectionism Without Naming Washington

UNGA81 And The Multipolar Drift | Part 11 Of 15

Image Source: @EOIBeijing on X

China used its address to the 81st UN General Assembly to present itself as a defender of the post-war order against unilateral force, bloc politics and protectionism, while avoiding the explicit language of multipolarity used by some of its partners.

Vice President Han Zheng, who delivered China's national statement on Saturday, September 26, said the UN-centred international system and the order underpinned by international law that emerged after the Second World War "must be upheld". He called on states to "reject the Cold War mindset and bloc confrontation" and to "oppose unilateral military actions that violate the UN Charter and circumvent Security Council authorization".

Major countries, he said, "shoulder special responsibilities" and "should take the lead in complying with rules, upholding rule of law and doing what's right". He did not name the United States.

The speech came against the background of the US-Israeli war with Iran and tightened US pressure on Cuba. Han said the sovereignty and security of Middle Eastern countries, including those in the Gulf, should be respected, and that supply chains and global trade should be kept stable and unimpeded. On Cuba he was blunt: "China urges the relevant country to immediately stop using threat of force against Cuba and immediately and completely lift the blockade and sanctions against Cuba."

On trade, he said "protectionism produces no winners" and that "building walls, erecting barriers, decoupling and cutting off supply chains" harmed everyone. China, he said, would defend the "WTO-centered, rules-based multilateral trading system". He pointed to China's decision to grant zero-tariff treatment to all African countries and least developed countries with which it has diplomatic relations, presenting it as support for the Global South.

On the UN itself, Han said all countries "big or small, are equal members of the international community" and that world affairs should be handled through consultation among all. He backed the UN80 reform initiative but said it should "enhance the performance of its bodies rather than merely cut its budgets and mandates", and that the UN should "truly increase the representation and voice of the Global South".

The word "multipolar" did not appear in the text. President Xi Jinping had used it at the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation summit in Bishkek on September 1, calling the trend towards a multipolar world irreversible. In New York, Beijing chose the vocabulary of the UN Charter, common security and fairness instead.

Han marked 55 years since General Assembly Resolution 2758 restored the rights of the People's Republic of China at the UN, said China contributes around 30 per cent of global growth, and invited delegates to a Global Governance Forum that China will host in Xiong'an New Area in October.

The address reflected careful positioning. Beijing aligned itself with the Global South's complaints about coercion and representation, and against unilateral force, while presenting China as a guardian of the existing order rather than a challenger to it.

The national statements delivered at this year's UN General Assembly left little doubt about how far the ground has shifted. Opening the debate, Secretary-General António Guterres told world leaders that "we are clearly moving towards a multipolar world" and that the movement is irreversible, though he warned it could take the shape of fragmentation and transactionalism rather than a networked order rooted in international law. The backdrop was hard to miss: a US-Israeli war with Iran nearly seven months old, the US capture of Venezuela's President Nicolás Maduro in January, and a US President who used the same podium to say he was weighing a deal with Tehran against "annihilating" it. Brazil's Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva said the World Trade Organization was on life support and condemned the use of tariffs as "a weapon of coercion and blackmail", while India's S. Jaishankar declared that the post-1945 order is giving way to new realities. Türkiye's Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and Spain's Pedro Sánchez, from very different vantage points, both called for an end to the veto held by the Security Council's five permanent members. Russia's Sergey Lavrov went further, telling the Assembly that "the dictatorship of a single hegemon has run amok" and that a fairer, multipolar order was emerging. What remains unsettled is not whether power is spreading, but whether the institutions built in 1945 can adjust fast enough to hold it together.