China and the Czech Republic – A Strategic Partnership?
- Where: Václav Havel Library, Ostrovní 13, Prague 110 00
- When: June 4, 2020, 19:00 – 21:00
In early June in the final year of normalisation, people in Czechoslovakia followed the events of the “Beijing Spring” via foreign broadcasts, sympathising with the victims of the Tiananmen Square massacre. A quarter-century later, the Czech government launched a “restart” of Czech-Chinese relations and the People’s Republic of China became our strategic partner.
Recent years have seen an unprecedented rise in Chinese influence around the world, though at the same time there is increasing distrust of Beijing and tensions between China and the US are intensifying. In a report last year the European Commission declared China to be a “systemic rival”. The coronavirus pandemic has revealed both the weaknesses and strengths of the Chinese political system and its crude methods in both domestic and international politics. In the meantime, the Czech Republic’s China policy, which is controlled by the Office of the President and the more or less undisguised interests of private entities, is floundering.
Professor Olga Lomová and guests from Sinopsis will discuss the direction being taken by China and the direction the Czech Republic ought to be taking.