Chinese state media commentators declared it “impossible” on Monday for Argentina to cut ties with Beijing following the election victory this weekend of anti-communist libertarian president-elect Javier Milei, who vowed not to promote cooperation with the Communist Party in favor of “civilized” nations.
Milei won Sunday’s presidential election in a landslide, besting opponent Sergio Massa, the socialist current economics minister, by over 11 percentage points. As a candidate, Milei vowed to dramatically limit the size of Argentina’s federal government, curb inflation by making the U.S. dollar an official national currency, and reorient the nation’s foreign policy towards the United States and Israel.
Under current President Alberto Fernández and several similar Peronist socialist governments, Argentina has dramatically increased cooperation with China, Russia, Iran, and other rogue nations. Argentina is a member of China’s predatory Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) and received approval for membership in the China-led BRICS coalition, scheduled to begin in January.
This photo, taken on Dec. 11, 2020, shows the scene of the signing ceremony of railway construction cooperation agreements between China and Argentina in Buenos Aires, Argentina. Companies involved in optimizing Argentina’s rail network include China Railway Construction Corporation CRCC, China Machinery Engineering Corporation, CRRC Corporation Limited and Yutong. (Xinhua/Martin Zabala via Getty Images)
Milei has referred to China as a “murderer” regime and his aides have indicated he has no interest in joining BRICS, an economic and security bloc including China, Russia, India, Brazil, and South Africa. Diana Mondino, the likely Argentine foreign minister under Milei, reportedly told the Russian news agency RIA Novosti that the Milei administration would “stop interacting with” China.
Mondino reportedly said the same thing about Brazil, currently led by socialist convicted felon Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. Milei has referred to Lula as a corrupt “communist” and described him as leading a government akin to that of China. In another slight to Lula, Milei’s first official invite to his inauguration on December 10 went to the man Lula defeated in Brazil’s 2022 election, former President Jair Bolsonaro.
Asked about Mondino’s comments on Tuesday, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Mao Ning warned that limiting China’s nefarious influence in Argentina would be a “huge foreign policy mistake.”
“It would be a huge foreign policy mistake for Argentina to cut ties with major countries like China or Brazil. China is Argentina’s important trading partner,” Mao said, according to the transcript of her regular press briefing on Tuesday. “The newly elected Argentine government values its relations with China, especially the business ties between the two countries.”
“China is Argentina’s second largest trading partner and the largest export market of agricultural products. The economic complementarity between our two countries means there is great potential for cooperation,” she continued. “China stands ready to work with Argentina to keep our relations on a steady course forward.”
The Global Times – the English-language accompaniment to the official newspaper of the Chinese Communist Party, the People’s Daily – published an article on Monday claiming Chinese regime-approved “experts” believed it “impossible” for Argentina’s economy to survive cutting ties with China. Predicting a “trial period” for ties between the two countries following Milei’s inaugural, the state propaganda outlet pointed to Argentina’s socialist-fueled “triple-digit inflation, a looming recession and rising poverty” as leaving Buenos Aires with no option to sever relations with its second-largest trade partner. (Brazil is Argentina’s top partner.) Paraphrasing a report in Reuters, the Global Times observed that Milei “will have to deal with the empty coffers of the government and central bank, a creaking $44 billion debt program with the International Monetary Fund, inflation nearing 150 percent and a dizzying array of capital controls” – the legacies of current Economic Minister Massa.
The Global Times “experts” said that Argentina simply “cannot leave its main trading partners” and decoupling from China was “impossible.” One of the experts, think-tank director Wang Youming, predicted that Milei would attempt to distance from Beijing only to “realize that it [Argentina] is inseparable from the help of China.”
“Yuan Dongzhen, a deputy director of the Latin American Institute of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, shares a similar view,” the Times continued. “He pointed out that it is impossible for Argentina to decouple from China, but bilateral exchanges could enter a trial period after the far-right politician takes office.”
China initially reacted coolly to Milei’s win, issuing a statement saying that the Communist Party “values its relations with Argentina from a strategic and long-term point of view and stands ready to work with Argentina to continue nurturing our friendship.”
Milei has for years condemned China, and communism generally, indicating that he had no interest in seeing his country maintain friendly ties to a “murderer” regime.
“I would do not business with China. It is false that it would be a macroeconomic tragedy,” he declared in 2021, when he first ran for office and established his political party, Liberty Advances. “We can make transactions with the civilized side of life. I don’t make transactions with communists.”
In September, speaking to American journalist Tucker Carlson, Milei reiterated that he would not seek close ties to China.
“Not only would I not do business with China, I won’t do business with any communist,” Milei told Carlson. “I am a defender of freedom, peace, and democracy. Communists have no place there. The Chinese have no place there. [Russian strongman Vladimir] Putin has no place there. Let’s go further: Lula has no place there.”
Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva attends a breakfast with accredited journalists at the Planalto Palace in Brasilia on January 12, 2023. (SERGIO LIMA/AFP via Getty Images)
Milei has since clarified that he would not use government force to ban Argentines from conducting business transactions with China – “it’s not my problem” – but that his government “will not align [itself] with communists, or with those who do not defend freedom, or with those who do not defend democracy, or who are not peaceful.”
On Monday, Milei announced that his first international travel after becoming president-elect would be to America and Israel, the countries he has repeatedly identified as his top prospective allies.