China's mouthpiece dubs Houston consulate closure as Trump's election gambit

Chinese state media said that the Trump administration ordered Beijing to shut its consulate in Houston in an attempt to shift the blame of its own failures ahead of presidential elections scheduled in November. Washington has ordered Beijing to shut its diplomatic consulate in Houston within 72 hours amid deteriorating relationship over several issues including intellectual property theft.

State-owned English language newspaper China Daily described the latest order as “a new gambit in the U.S. administration’s bid to paint China as a malevolent actor on the world stage, and thus make it an outlaw to the international community”. It said the move shows that US President Donald Trump is “going all out” in his attempts to project China as an evil agent since he is lagging behind his opponents in upcoming presidential polls.

The South China Morning Post reported that China is likely to close the US consulate in Chengdu as a retaliatory measure. The United States has five consulates in mainland China - in Guangzhou, Shanghai, Shenyang, Chengdu and Wuhan – apart from consulate general for Hong Kong and Macau. China’s Ambassador to Austria had indicated an equal countermeasure, saying it would be impolite to not retaliate in equal measures.

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'Won't choose Wuhan'

Hu Xijin, editor the Global Times, a mouthpiece of Chinese Communist Party, wrote in a column that shutting the Wuhan consulate would not be sufficiently disruptive. Hu said that the United States will suffer only a small loss if China asks it to shut down its consulate in Wuhan. He added that the US consulates are probably making “emergency plans, packing up documents and preparing to burn them.” 

“I believe if China decides to close a US consulate in China as a tit-for-tat retaliation, it won't choose the Wuhan. Such a choice will be too much to the US advantage,” he wrote.

Earlier, China’s Foreign Ministry spokesperson Wang Wenbin had urged the United States to immediately reverse the decision, warning that China will otherwise “certainly” make legitimate and necessary reactions. Wang had called the order unprecedented and illegal under international law and accused the US of harassing Chinese diplomats and consular staff in America.

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