AMN / WEB DESK
Amid sharp criticism of China’s Zero-COVID policy by foreign diplomats and businesses and its heavy toll on Chinese economy, Chinese Premier Li Keqiang, for the first time assured to make China’s COVID control measures more targeted and well-calibrated including steadily improving visa and COVID testing policies, and further resuming and increasing international passenger flights in an orderly way.
At the Special Virtual Dialogue with Global Business Leaders hosted by the World Economic Forum on Tuesday, Li, China’s No 2 political figure, said all international students may return to China to continue their studies should they so wish, and outbound commerce and trade activities and cross-border travel for labor services will be advanced in an orderly fashion.
Li’s remarks to permit the return of the international students are significant as lakhs of foreign students studying at Chinese universities, including over 23,000 Indians, were stranded in their respective countries in the last two years due to China’s COVID-related ban on international flights and visa. However, Chinese foreign ministry on Thursday again denied giving any timeline for return of Indian students. India has months ago submitted a list of several hundred students after China sought the names of those wanting to return immediately to pursue their studies. China has been processing the list since then. Some stranded students from Sri Lanka, Pakistan, Russia and several other countries began arriving on chartered flights in the recent few weeks.
“This will promote personnel inter-flow and exchanges and cooperation between China and the world,” he was quoted as saying by an official press release. Under the zero COVID policy, China had cut international flight connectivity drastically in the last two years to insulate itself from the coronavirus which first surfaced in the central Chinese city of Wuhan in December 2019. China is also permitting flights from different countries but not yet from India.
Li’s assurance to global business leaders to open up China came as the Chinese economy was hit hard by the zero COVID policy resulting in prolonged lockdowns of top cities damaging businesses and industrial supply chains. The world’s second-largest economy grew by only 0.4 percent year on year in the second quarter, the lowest in two years, far lower than the 4.8 percent notched up in the first quarter, and well below the full-year target of “around 5.5 percent”, according to the official data released last week. It is the lowest growth rate since China’s economy shrank by 6.8 percent in the first quarter of 2020 after the coronavirus which surfaced in Wuhan and later spread to the world shut down most parts of the country. Frustrated by China’s unending Zero-COVID policy, many foreign enterprises have left China and foreign capital has also flown out.
A survey by the European Union Chamber of Commerce in China, which was completed by 372 firms between April 21-27, when Shanghai was part way through its lockdown, showed that 23 percent of respondents were considering shifting current or planned investments out of the country. US and British chambers have issued similar warnings about the impact of Covid-induced uncertainty on business confidence.
The slowdown of the economy comes ahead of the ruling Communist Party of China’s key once-in-a-five-year congress expected to be held shortly, which is widely expected to endorse an unprecedented third term for President Xi Jinping after the party founder Mao Zedong. The downturn in Chinese real estate sector, one of the powerhouses of China’s economy and nation’s biggest banking scam in Henan and Anhui provinces have further deteriorated the situation but Li said China will not employ large-scale stimulus to hit economic growth targets, but it will maintain targeted macro policies.