Biden Seeks to Woo Global South Away From China at G-

20
foreignpolicy.com/2023/09/07/g-20-summit-biden-india-china-bri-developing-nations-lending-debt

Alexandra Sharp

World Brief
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The U.S. president hopes to present developing nations with an

alternative to Beijing’s Belt and Road Initiative.

An
illustration
of
Alexandra
Sharp,
World
Brief
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Alexandra
Sharp

By Alexandra Sharp, the World Brief writer at Foreign Policy.

 An Indian artist works on an oil painting of U.S. President Joe Biden.
Indian artist Jagjot Singh Rubal gives final touches to an oil painting of U.S.
President Joe Biden at his workshop in Amritsar, India, on Sept. 5. Narinder
Nanu/AFP via Getty Images

September 7, 2023, 7:00 PM

Welcome back to World Brief, where we’re looking at U.S. President
Joe Biden’s ambitious goals for the G-20 summit in India, Mexico’s
decision to decriminalize abortion nationwide, and the release of former
Gabonese President Ali Bongo Ondimba.

Vying for Dominance

U.S. President Joe Biden touched down in India on Thursday in

anticipation of the much-heralded G-20 summit—and he’s already
making waves. Capitalizing on the looming absences of Chinese
President Xi Jinping and Russian President Vladimir Putin, Biden was
quick to assert U.S. dominance over the economic bloc and remind
developing countries that Washington is their best ally for
advancement. This will be Xi’s first time missing the summit since
coming to power in 2013, and it is the second consecutive year that
Putin is skipping out.

Upon arriving in New Delhi, Biden touted his G-20 proposals for
countering Chinese influence and promoting the global south. He
announced plans to strengthen the World Bank and International
Monetary Fund (IMF) to better assist developing nations in repaying
their debts. Biden has repeatedly turned to the two Western-led
institutions as alternatives to China’s Belt and Road Initiative.

“Given both the scale of the need and, frankly, the scale of [China’s]
coercive and unsustainable lending through the Belt and Road
Initiative, we need to ensure that there are high-standard, high-
leverage solutions to the challenges countries are facing,” said U.S.
National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan.

Biden’s focus on lending practices comes after the White House asked
the U.S. Congress for $2 billion to fund World Bank and IMF projects. It
also furthers Washington’s pledge to raise $600 billion by 2027 for the
Partnership for Global Infrastructure and Investment, a U.S.-led
alternative to the Belt and Road.

Beijing has increasingly championed Chinese-led economic initiatives

as more promising alternatives for the global south than traditional
Western-dominated economic groupings, such as the G-7 and G-20. At
last month’s BRICS summit, for instance, founding members Brazil,
Russia, India, China, and South Africa invited six new countries to join
the economic bloc, which many experts saw as a big win for China.
However, the G-20 and BRICS are still largely incomparable. Whereas
the G-20 makes up 85 percent of global GDP, the original BRICS
members plus the newly invited six nations still only represent as much
as 36 percent.

Biden hopes that Xi’s absence at the G-20, which runs from Sept. 9-10,
will demonstrate that Beijing is in no position to help developing
countries—especially as it fails to alleviate its own deflation and
property crisis. China’s yuan slid to a 16-year low on Thursday as the
U.S. dollar gained strength.

Following the G-20, Biden is set to visit Vietnam for two days to
strengthen bilateral ties with the growing economic power. Despite
Hanoi and Washington only normalizing relations in 1995, the two
nations have developed a robust trade relationship to counter Chinese
influence in the Indo-Pacific. The United States is Vietnam’s largest
export market.

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What We’re Following

Mexico’s green wave. In a major win for access to reproductive care,

Mexico’s Supreme Court decriminalized abortion on Thursday. It is now
illegal across all of Mexico’s 32 states to criminally penalize terminating
a pregnancy. Mexico City became the first state to decriminalize
abortions in 2007, but it was the state court of Coahuila’s ruling in
2021, which said that an existing law punishing those who seek
abortions was unconstitutional, that kick-started a federal decision.

In the past three decades, at least 59 countries, including Mexico, have

expanded abortion access. In Latin America, the feminist movement’s
rise, growing birthrates among girls under age 15, and calls to make
reproductive access a human right have all pushed the region toward
expanding abortion protections. The United States, meanwhile, has
gone the other direction since its 2022 Supreme Court decision
overturning Roe v. Wade, a 1973 ruling that established a constitutional
right to an abortion.

Bongo released. Gabon’s ruling junta announced the release of

ousted President Ali Bongo Ondimba on Thursday after holding him
and his family captive at the presidential palace since the Aug. 30 coup
that embroiled the Central African nation. Bongo is now free to travel
abroad for medical appointments. The announcement follows pressure
from neighboring countries and the Economic Community of Central
African States to free the former leader.

Bongo held power for 14 years before a military junta deposed him
from office. Before Bongo, his father ruled for 41 years. The family’s
removal from power has been widely celebrated by many Gabonese,
who argue that the Bongos enriched themselves with income earned
through Gabon’s oil industry while much of the population struggled
with high levels of poverty.

Corruption sentencing. Former Guatemalan President Otto Pérez

Molina was sentenced to eight years in prison on Thursday for money
laundering and fraud. While in office, Pérez Molina received millions of
dollars in bribes for granting more than 70 contracts to numerous
corporations. Pérez Molina was forced from office in 2015 by anti-
corruption protests and has been imprisoned ever since.

Last year, Pérez Molina and his vice president were found guilty of
taking bribes from Guatemala’s customs authorities in an investigation
conducted by the International Commission Against Impunity in
Guatemala. However, that U.N.-backed body has since been kicked
out of the country by Pérez Molina’s successor, Jimmy Morales, after it
began investigating Morales.

Tinubu’s election win stands. Nigerian President Bola Tinubu

breathed a sigh of relief on Wednesday after a Nigerian appeals court
rejected a petition that challenged Tinubu’s qualifications to run for
reelection. According to the court, there was also not sufficient
evidence to prove that voting irregularities marred February’s election.
The petitioners have the right to appeal the decision to the country’s
Supreme Court within 60 days. The decision likely did not come as a
surprise to the opposition, though; despite repeated challenges to
election results in the country since 1999, no presidential election has
been overturned.

Odds and Ends

One marathon competitor took his passion for running to a whole new
level. On Wednesday, the U.S. Coast Guard arrested Iranian athlete
Reza Baluchi for trying to “run to London” via a homemade hamster
wheel-esque vessel—Atlantic Ocean, be damned. The 44-year-old
refused to leave the contraption for three days. There’s a lot to unpack
here.
Alexandra Sharp is the World Brief writer at Foreign Policy.
Twitter: @AlexandraSSharp
Tags: Developing Countries, Geopolitics, International Organizations,
United States