Coercion or altruism: is China using its Covid vaccines to wield global power? | Australian foreign policy

tweet I n May 2020, China's president, Xi Jinping, told the World Health Assembly its Covid-19 vaccines were "a global public good", and their distribution would be part of Xi's vision of a "shared future for the people of the world to work as one". But in the months since, China's alleged "vaccine diplomacy" has been consistently criticised internationally for being rolled out with conditions attached, with allegations of expatriate Chinese nationals being prioritised, and the distribution of vaccines seen as a coercive tool with which to wield geopolitical influence. In Paraguay, the government reported it had been approached by…