China's Two Session Meeting To Begin This Week
Beijing, China: China’s annual Two Sessions meetings start this week. Thousands of political and community delegates from across mainland China, Hong Kong and Macau will touch down in Beijing to ratify legislation, personnel changes and the budget. The meeting will last for over about two weeks of highly choreographed meetings.
The event is called the “two sessions” because both the National People’s Congress (NPC) and the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) hold their annual meetings separately, but at the same time. The CPPCC is an advisory body, with little real political influence. However, it often sees some outside-the-box proposals for issues like China’s demographic crisis. The members include business executives, celebrities. Jackie Chan and basketballer Yao Ming once attended the meetings.
The meetings include “work report” speeches by the premier, and sometimes speeches by the party leader. Reportedly, official economic targets are set, military budgets announced, and changes in the ranks of party leadership bodies are confirmed.
This year, the observers are looking out for major economic stimulus policies to address China’s struggling economy and high youth unemployment. Changes in approach towards tech industry will also be discussed.
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There will likely be pronouncements on Taiwan. President Xi Jinping and the Chinese Communist party (CCP) have long voiced their intentions to annex Taiwan, refusing to rule out using force to do so. Taiwan’s government and people increasingly oppose the prospect of Chinese rule. The atmosphere started to turn fragile lately, with China’s language about Taiwan has grown a little harsher.
The Two Sessions are usually held with detailed planning of all thing including tiniest of matters. However, unexpected things still take place. At the 2022 Party Congress Peng Lifa staged a brave protest at Sitong Bridge in Beijing. Peng was detained, his location still unknown, and authorities now closely guard Beijing bridges during political events to ensure it won’t be repeated.
At that same 2022 event, foreign press captured the extraordinary moment that former president Hu Jintao was physically removed from his seat next to Xi and shuffled out of the room.
A huge crowd of foreign media. Many of them touch down in Beijing for the meeting and a rare chance to interact with CCP officials in person. In 2024, the annual premier’s press conference was abruptly cancelled without explanation, closing down one of the already limited forums for transparency in the country.
US President Donald Trump’s new tariff threat will also be on the table. US has doubled down on tariff against Chinese imports. As a retaliation, China said it would impose fresh tariffs on a range of agricultural imports from the US next week.
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Beijing said additional 15% tariffs would be imposed on chicken, wheat, corn and cotton, with further 10% tariffs on sorghum, soya beans, pork, beef, aquatic products, fruits, vegetables and dairy products. The country also raised additional complaints against the US with the World Trade Organization.
A 25% tariff on Canada and Mexico and a 10% levy on China amounts to “the largest tax increase in at least a generation”, according to the Peterson Institute for International Economics, a thinktank that estimated the move would cost the typical US household more than $1,200 each year, said BBC.
Scott Bessent, the US Treasury secretary, said that Chinese manufacturers would swallow the US tariffs. He said, “China’s business model is export, export, export, and that’s unacceptable. I am highly confident that the Chinese manufacturers will eat the tariffs; prices won’t go up”.
Trump claimed that the tariffs on China are because the government has failed to stop illicit fentanyl entering the US, which Beijing says is a “pretext” to threaten China.
(With inputs from agencies)
