Commentary: Arbitrary sanctions expose U.S. as "worst human rights violator"

BEIJING, March 23 (Xinhua) -- It's uncanny and surreal to see "the worst human rights violator in the world" sanction others on unfounded grounds of human rights violations.

It's like a thief crying "stop thief."

The latest sanctions imposed by the United States against Chinese officials for so-called human rights violations are ideologically and politically driven. By maligning and smearing China, the U.S. move contravened international law and basic norms governing international relations and grossly interfered in China's internal affairs.

Arbitrary sanctions are one of the commonly used tools in the U.S. foreign policy arsenal. Such political and economic leverages, overused and abused, always backfire, bringing hostilities rather than solutions and even constituting a systemic violation of human rights.

The Chinese people can tell better than anyone else how the human rights conditions in China are. A country that has lifted millions out of absolute poverty and upheld a "life first" philosophy in battling the pandemic best knows what human rights are.

Regarding human rights, the United States is in no position to pass judgment. The country, which should repent for butchering the Native Americans and inflicting sufferings on people in countries that it aggressed, is itself in the position to reflect on its own human rights deficit.

Instead of trampling on human rights in other countries in the name of safeguarding human rights, the so-called "beacon of democracy" should address its own systemic and chronic issues. If the United States ceases being a lecturer of human rights, the situation in the world will improve.

The China-U.S. relationship, instead of getting out of the predicament created by the previous U.S. administration, has encountered a growing number of challenges. The direct cause for the current situation is that some people on the U.S. side have not followed through on the important common understanding reached by the two Presidents and have not acted on President Biden's positive statements.

The current arbitrary sanctions against the Chinese officials are the latest proof.

The U.S. move defies logic and common sense when Washington on the one hand repeatedly and publicly presses China to work with it on international hotspot issues while on the other hand damages the bilateral relations intentionally.

The United States should view China's human rights situation in an objective and just manner and immediately revoke its so-called sanctions. Otherwise, as China's Foreign Ministry has warned, the Chinese side shall take reciprocal countermeasures in response.