Trump Uses UN Speech To Eviscerate China: 'Must Hold Accountable the Nation Which Unleashed This Plague'
President Donald Trump used his Tuesday address to the 75th United Nations General Assembly to cover a myriad of topics, but one in particular stood out.
Trump blasted China over a multitude of issues, primarily focusing on the coronavirus that has rocked the world, and didn’t mince words.
“Seventy-five years after the end of World War II and the founding of the United Nations, we are once again engaged in a great global struggle. We have waged a fierce battle against the invisible enemy — the China virus — which has claimed countless lives in 188 countries,” Trump said in his address.
Trump discussed America’s work developing a vaccine for COVID-19, but it didn’t take him long to set his sights on China again.
“As we pursue this bright future, we must hold accountable the nation which unleashed this plague onto the world: China,” Trump said.
“In the earliest days of the virus, China locked down travel domestically while allowing flights to leave China and infect the world. China condemned my travel ban on their country, even as they canceled domestic flights and locked citizens in their homes.”
Trump also took aim at the World Health Organization for being “virtually controlled by China.”
“The Chinese government and the World Health Organization — which is virtually controlled by China — falsely declared that there was no evidence of human-to-human transmission,” he said.
“Later, they falsely said people without symptoms would not spread the disease.
“The United Nations must hold China accountable for their actions,” Trump told the general assembly. Whether the U.N. will do so remains to be seen.
But it wasn’t just the coronavirus that Trump lambasted the Chinese Communist Party over. He also directed his ire at China’s environmental track record.
“In addition, every year, China dumps millions and millions of tons of plastic and trash into the oceans, overfishes other countries’ waters, destroys vast swaths of coral reef and emits more toxic mercury into the atmosphere than any country anywhere in the world,” Trump said. “China’s carbon emissions are nearly twice what the U.S. has, and it’s rising fast. By contrast, after I withdrew from the one-sided Paris Climate Accord, last year America reduced its carbon emissions by more than any country in the agreement.
“Those who attack America’s exceptional environmental record while ignoring China’s rampant pollution are not interested in the environment. They only want to punish America, and I will not stand for it.”
Finally, Trump called out “decades of China’s trade abuses.”
But perhaps Trump’s most poignant comments regarding China didn’t even mention the nation by name.
“America will always be a leader in human rights. My administration is advancing religious liberty, opportunity for women, the decriminalization of homosexuality, combatting human trafficking and protecting unborn children,” he said.
While not explicitly mentioning China, Trump’s remarks on human rights could certainly be construed as a dig against China’s alleged treatment of Uighur Muslims.
