Officials from the Houston Fire Department and Houston Police Department are responding to reports that documents are being set on fire in the courtyard at the Chinese Consulate-General in Houston.
“Houston police say they began receiving the reports that documents were being burned just after 8 p.m. at 3417 Montrose Boulevard where the Consulate General of China is located,” Click 2 Houston reported. “A small amount of smoke could be seen and smelled from outside. Dozens of Houston first responders are at the scene.”
A video that was obtained by the news station appeared to show people setting fires to several trash cans full of items.
WATCH:
https://twitter.com/KPRC2Tulsi/status/1285772143788261376
.@HoustonFire and @houstonpolice are responding to reports of documents being burned at the Consulate General of China on 3417 Montrose Boulevard. Here's what the scene looks like there right now. pic.twitter.com/grUHhqmUz4
— KPRC2Tulsi (@KPRC2Tulsi) July 22, 2020
Tensions between the United States and China have continued to escalate in recent weeks after they hit near all-time highs earlier this year over the Chinese Communist Party’s lies about the coronavirus pandemic.
In mid-July, President Donald Trump signed a bill into law that sanctioned “Chinese officials, businesses and banks that help China restrict Hong Kong’s autonomy, a move that is likely to worsen already-strained diplomatic ties and prompt retaliation from Beijing,” Politico reported. “Signing the sanctions bill into law marks the Trump administration’s latest move to punish China for its new national security law that U.S. officials, lawmakers and legal experts say effectively ends the former British colony’s separate legal system.”
Trump said, “This law gives my administration powerful new tools to hold responsible the individuals and the entities involved in extinguishing Hong Kong’s freedom.”
Trump further upped the ante this week when the administration “barred 11 new Chinese companies from purchasing American technology and products without a special license, saying the firms were complicit in human rights violations in China’s campaign targeting Muslim minorities in the Xinjiang region,” The New York Times reported. “The list of sanctioned companies includes current and former suppliers to major international brands such as Apple, Ralph Lauren, Google, HP, Tommy Hilfiger, Hugo Boss and Muji, according to a report by the Australian Strategic Policy Institute, a think tank established by the Australian government.”
Chinese Communist Party propagandist Hua Chunyin lashed out on Friday in response to a devastating speech that Attorney General William Barr gave on the danger and threat that China is to the world.
“Some in the U.S., driven by ideological bias, have been sparing no effort to paint China as a rival or even adversary, smear and attack China and encircle and contain its development,” Hua, whose official title is “Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman,” told reporters. “The U.S. is pressing the accelerator to trash China-U.S. relations, while China is putting the brakes on.”
“Certain U.S. politicians are so irresponsible that they will say whatever needs to be said to make China a target,” she claimed. “The world has already seen through the U.S. playbook of fabricating narratives to deflect attention. Possessed by such evil, they are on the brink of losing their mind.”
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