ES Views Letter of the Day: Trump is gifting Xi world leadership

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Power games: President Trump and President Xi meet at the G20 summit in July

20 December 2017

I could not disagree more with Peter Frankopan’s analysis that the power struggle in the Middle East will determine the shape of global affairs [Comment, December 15]. It is the struggle between the United States and China which matters most.

While China makes huge investment in renewable and alternative energy and trade links through its One Road, One Belt programme with the rest of Eurasia, Donald Trump has refused to sign trade agreements with Asian countries and is the only nation not to have ratified the Paris climate agreement.

So while the US President stokes the flames of war in the Middle East by extending the “war on terror” into a sectarian one by saying he thinks Israel can claim Jerusalem, Chinese President Xi Jinping has claimed the high ground on globalisation and climate change.

If anything, Trump has accelerated the process of the US losing its global power.
Murad Qureshi