China discusses protecting assets from sanctions in case of conflict
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Sources reveal to the Financial Times that decoupling the Chinese and Western economies will be "far more severe than [decoupling with] Russia."
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The Chinese Central Bank
The Financial Times reported that Chinese regulators have held an emergency meeting with domestic and foreign banks to discuss the possibility of protecting China's assets abroad from US-led sanctions.
According to the paper, the meeting was driven by the possibility of sanctions being imposed on China, like those imposed on Russia, in case a regional conflict or another crisis were to take place.
The Financial Times' sources said that the meeting, which took place on April 22, was attended by representatives from the Central Bank and the Chinese Finance Ministry.
The meeting began with a talk by a senior official from the Chinese Finance Ministry who said that Chinese President Xi Jinping's administration has been alerted by the ability of the West to freeze the Russian Central Bank's dollar assets.
Although the attendees did not mention specific scenarios where China could face sanctions, the sources said that one such scenario could come about if China attacks Taiwan, which it believes to be part of its territory, and has warned of its attempts to break away.
If China attacks Taiwan
“If China attacks Taiwan, decoupling of the Chinese and western economies will be far more severe than [decoupling with] Russia because China’s economic footprint touches every part of the world,” one of the people briefed on the meeting said.
The Chinese Embassy in Washington told Sputnik on Friday that US officials are misleading people by drawing parallels between Taiwan and Ukraine explaining that Taiwan is an "inalienable" part of China's territory.
"[...] the Taiwan question is entirely China's internal affair. The Taiwan question and the Ukraine issue are different in nature and are not comparable at all," Spokesperson Liu Pengyu said.
Read more: Explaining Taiwan: The Balance of Relations between the US and China
He went on to accuse Washington of colluding with Taipei, stressing that certain individuals deliberately drew a parallel between Taiwan and Ukraine "despite the two being fundamentally different issues."
He concluded by telling Sputnik that the goal of this parallelism was "to mislead the public and profit from that."
The West, mainly the United States and the United Kingdom, have pledged to arm Taiwan as they have Ukraine.
