US tells countries fearful about Chinese economic coercion ‘you are not alone’: State Department

The US is “more than happy” to share “what we know about Beijing’s playbook” on economic coercion, according to a senior State Department official on Monday.

Hart’s remarks came at the launch of a report titled “Investigating China’s economic coercion: The reach and role of Chinese corporate entities” held at the Atlantic Council, a Washington-based think tank.

While some countries welcomed “very public support” from the US, others “prefer quiet engagement”, she said, adding that the US was “entirely flexible” in how it could help.

“Our aim is very simple. If our partners feel supported, they have the breathing room to make decisions if and when they are threatened or subjected to coercion. We consider that a win.”

Last year, Washington created the Countering Economic Coercion Task Force to help allies and partners tackle what it regarded as Beijing’s economic coercion.

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Beijing balks at any international support that might lend a sense of international legitimacy to Taiwan, a self-ruled island. China claims Taiwan as an integral part of its sovereignty and has pledged to reunite it with the mainland, by force if necessary.

China produces about 67 per cent of the world’s natural graphite. It dominates global production of gallium and germanium as well, at 80 per cent and 60 per cent, respectively.

It said the “unique structure” of the party-state apparatus gave Beijing levers to exert “significant influence” over Chinese corporate entities to target a particular country.

In recent months American subsidiaries of several Chinese companies have faced political and public opposition to their plans to set up electric vehicle battery plants in the US over their links to the CCP.

William Piekos, the report’s author and a non-resident fellow at the Atlantic Council’s Global China Hub, on Monday said to “always be sceptical” of such companies and their links to the party.

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Piekos also called for open-source investigations into these firms’ by-laws and ownership structures in addition to “nuanced and comprehensive” understanding of Chinese corporate entities, their acquisitions and subsidiaries as well as their role in Beijing’s economic statecraft.

“Certainly we should be wary of their links to the CCP”, he said of the Ford-CATL deal, but as of now he felt less concerned about it, believing Beijing was “looking into this deal through their equivalent of investment screening”.

After months of political scrutiny, Ford in September announced it was halting the construction of a US$3.5 billion plant in Michigan stemming from the agreement. The chairs of three US House of Representatives committees have demanded the company submit documents related to the deal.