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November 23, 2020

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Xi backs global pandemic ‘firewall’

Source: Xinhua | 00:05 UTC+8 November 23, 2020 | Print Edition

CHINESE President Xi Jinping on Saturday proposed constructing a “global firewall” against COVID-19, reducing tariffs and barriers as well as tapping into the booming digital economy to battle the pandemic and reboot the flagging world economy.

Addressing the Group of 20 Riyadh Summit via video link, Xi said the group has once again played an “important and irreplaceable” role in the global war against the pandemic which has “impacted the world in a more profound way than the 2008 global financial crisis did.”

“To contain the virus, stabilize the economy and protect livelihood remains a long and arduous journey for all countries,” Xi said. “While containing the virus, we must also stabilize and restore economic growth.”

His remarks came as humanity is grappling with growing uncertainties caused by the pandemic pullback, a global recession, as well as backlash to economic globalization.

The G20 groups the world’s major economies whose combined GDP accounts for over 85 percent of the world’s total.

They are widely expected to take more initiatives through closer cooperation to address the pandemic, and its lasting and far-reaching impact on the world economy.

Xi called on the G20 members to make concerted efforts in fighting “the most serious pandemic in a century” as the rising toll entails a coordinated response.

“We should speed up action and support the World Health Organization in mobilizing and consolidating resources and distributing vaccines fairly and efficiently,” Xi said.

The helmsman of the world’s second largest economy said China stands ready to step up cooperation with other countries on research and development, production and distribution of vaccines for COVID-19.

“We will honor our commitment of giving assistance and support to other developing countries, and work to make vaccines a global public good accessible and affordable to people around the world,” Xi pledged.

“China’s message is clear — vaccines should be a global public good and so should its vision of a stronger community with a shared future,” Feng Zhongping, vice president of China Institutes of Contemporary International Relations, said.

In March, Xi called for a resolute all-out global war against the COVID-19 outbreak as leaders of the G20 convened an extraordinary online summit to coordinate multilateral response to the pandemic.

It was the first time for G20 leaders to hold a summit virtually ever since the mechanism, which used to only gather finance ministers and central bankers, was elevated to be the world’s premier platform for international economic cooperation in 2008.

The two-day summit, along with three other key multilateral diplomatic events that the Chinese leader attended within less than two weeks, has seen Xi champion multilateralism and free global trade.

He proposed that the G20 should ensure the smooth functioning of the global economy and restore the secure and smooth operation of global industrial and supply chains, reduce tariffs and barriers.

Xi said China has put off debt repayment totaling over US$1.3 billion, pledging that the country will strengthen measures on debt suspension and relief for countries with particular difficulties.

“We should firmly safeguard the rules-based multilateral trading system that is transparent, nondiscriminatory, open and inclusive,” Xi said, calling on the G20 to oppose unilateralism and protectionism, and safeguard developing countries’ right to and space of development.

He reiterated China’s new development paradigm is by no means to close its doors but to build a new system of open economy of higher standards.

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