French Foreign Minister Says U.S. Is Hesitating Over Its Global Leadership Role Which Lets China Say 'I Am the Power'

The French foreign minister has said that the U.S. is hesitating in playing its global leadership role and expressed fears that the coronavirus pandemic is being used as a weapon to fight out international rivalries.

Last week, the French foreign ministry summoned Beijing's ambassador to Paris, Lu Shaye, for a dressing down over claims on China's Embassy website by an anonymous author that workers at French nursing homes had abandoned their posts and left residents to die.

In an interview with Le Monde, Jean-Yves Le Drian was asked about the incident and whether China was trying to take the place of Washington as the main global power, especially as the coronavirus pandemic played out.

"People say that the world afterwards will look nothing like the world did beforehand. I share this wish, but it's only a prediction. My fear is that the world will look significantly like it did before, only worse."

"It seems we are witnessing a widening of the fractures that have plagued the international order for years. The pandemic is the continuation, through other means, of the struggle between powers."

Concerned that the crisis was showing the limitations of coordinating a global health response, he suggested that the World Health Organization (WHO) should set up a council overseeing human and animal health and also work better with other health initiatives like Unitaid and the Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance.

In Le Drian's view, the system of multilateralism had been hit hard because, "major players are withdrawing, as illustrated by the American decision to suspend its contribution to the WHO, when it is the only universal organization capable of fighting the pandemic."

Amid reports of distrust between Washington and Beijing, Trump—while facing scrutiny over his own response to the outbreak—has sought to deflect blame to China. On Monday, the White House adviser Peter Navarro said that China may be withholding data about early coronavirus infections because it wants to win the race to create a vaccine, Reuters reported.

Le Drian told Le Monde there was a "struggle" in which the coronavirus was also allowing "a systematization of the balance of power that we saw rising long before, with the exacerbation of Sino-American rivalry."

"The United States is a great power which seems to hesitate playing its leadership role on a world level. This leads to its withdrawal and makes it difficult to take collective action on the major challenges of humanity.

"Consequently, China feels in a position to be able to say one day 'I am the power and the leadership'. We hope that the United States will fulfill its responsibilities and maintain a relationship of trust with its allies," Drian added.

The infographic below, provided by Statista, shows the countries with the most confirmed COVID-19 cases as of April 21.