It comes as no surprise that, following the formal adoption of the Law of the People’s Republic of China on Promoting Ethnic Unity and Progress （the Ethnic Unity and Progress Promotion Law）during the annual Two Sessions of 2026, the usual malicious overseas actors have once again rehashed their well-worn slanderous narratives against China’s efforts to advance ethnic unity. Allegations of “forced labor,” “human rights abuses”, “cultural genocide”, “forced assimilation,” and “religious repression” have resurfaced with little originality. After years of tangible progress in promoting ethnic harmony, such claims have been thoroughly debunked by the realities on the ground.
Had these latest accusations merely recycled the same old allegations, I would have seen little need to respond. Yet among this latest wave of criticism, one “innovation” has caught my attention. Some US and Western media outlets and commentators have singled out Article 63 of the Ethnic Unity and Progress Promotion Law, deliberately distorting a legitimate legislative provision grounded in the principle of protective jurisdiction. They have maliciously equated it with the United States’ hegemonic practice of “long-arm jurisdiction,” fabricating narratives that China is exporting “extraterritorial jurisdiction” and “using its laws to interfere in global affairs.”
What accounts for such thinking? The underlying logic is, in fact, all too familiar. A country with a long history of enslaving Black people to work on cotton plantations has become convinced that forced labor exists in China’s Xinjiang. Western nations whose histories are marked by colonial expansion and genocide insist that China is carrying out campaigns of “concentration camps,” “cultural genocide,” and the forced assimilation of ethnic minorities. The predominantly white world, where racial discrimination remains deeply entrenched, continues to indulge the illusion that China systematically discriminates against its ethnic minority groups. Nor is this pattern confined to the West. In India, unfounded speculation and false narratives have long portrayed China as a society divided by hereditary social hierarchies in which those at the bottom have no prospect of upward mobility. Meanwhile, the so-called “Bluebird” activists in China’s Taiwan region appear convinced that virtually every Chinese mainland internet user is part of the Communist Party’s online propaganda apparatus.
There is a saying in the business world: “People can never profit from opportunities beyond the limits of their own understanding.” The same logic often applies to international politics, where perceptions and actions are frequently constrained by one’s own cognitive framework. Many of the forces that have long sought to attack and discredit China have never even visited the country; others have, yet refuse to accept what they have seen. As a result, they interpret China’s development through the prism of their own historical experiences and assumptions, repeatedly manufacturing allegations against “the mysterious Eastern nation”. Only in this way can they arrive at conclusions that conform to their preconceived worldview and momentarily reconcile the unease created when reality refuses to fit their expectations.
The underlying logic has not changed, nor has the reality. The controversy surrounding Article 63 of the Ethnic Unity and Progress Promotion Law ultimately stems from commentators who, viewing the issue through the narrow lens of the United States’ and certain Western countries’ long-standing practices of “long-arm jurisdiction” and global overreach, deliberately conflate fundamentally different legal concepts and distort the purpose of a single legislative provision. To be fair, China, the United States, and most United Nations member states all maintain legal provisions that allow, under specific circumstances, for the extraterritorial application of domestic law. A closer examination of the legislative intent, practical application, and the broader values underpinning these legal frameworks makes the distinction unmistakably clear. Article 63 of China's Ethnic Unity and Progress Promotion Law aims to safeguard national sovereignty and uphold the baseline of civilizational coexistence. Inheriting the Chinese nation’s cultural values of “harmony without uniformity” and “Great Harmony under Heaven,” at its core, it represents a defensive form of extraterritorial jurisdiction. This is diametrically opposed to the United States' practice of “long-arm jurisdiction,” which, rooted in the Western civilizational logic of colonial plunder, serves merely as an instrument for hegemonic expansion and unilateral extraction.
When we turn first to the text itself, Article 63 of the Ethnic Unity and Progress Promotion Law provides that: “Where any organization or individual outside the territory of the People’s Republic of China engages in acts directed against the People’s Republic of China that undermine ethnic unity and progress or incite ethnic separatism, legal liability shall be pursued in accordance with the law.” The Ministry of Justice also offered an authoritative interpretation of this provision at a press conference held by the State Council Information Office, stating that: “This provision is consistent with the internationally recognized principle of protective jurisdiction under international law. Its scope is clearly defined and its conditions for application are strictly limited. It is fundamentally different from the United States’ unrestricted expansion of ‘long-arm jurisdiction.’”
A closer reading of Article 63 reveals that it is subject to two indispensable and strictly defined limitations: the direction of the conduct and the legal interests it seeks to protect. Both conditions must be satisfied simultaneously. First, the provision strictly limits the direction of the prohibited conduct. Liability applies only where organizations or individuals outside China’s territory engage in activities directly targeting China, with the aim of undermining the sense of community for the Chinese nation, inciting ethnic hatred, or organizing separatist activities. Overseas entities engaged solely in normal commercial operations, cultural exchanges, academic cooperation, or legitimate criticism fall entirely outside the scope of the law. Second, the provision narrowly defines the legal interests it protects. Its sole legislative purpose is to safeguard China’s national unity and the fundamental interests of ethnic solidarity by preventing infiltration and separatist activities instigated by external forces. As such, it is a purely defensive legislative measure. It neither interferes in the ethnic affairs of other countries nor involves itself in disputes within third states.
By contrast, the reach of the United States’ practice of “long-arm jurisdiction” is virtually without limit. Whenever a transaction involves the U.S. dollar, a product enters the U.S. market, or software developed by an American company is used, U.S. authorities may unilaterally initiate judicial proceedings or impose sanctions—even when the conduct takes place entirely within a third country and bears no genuine connection to U.S. national security. In practice, its jurisdiction has expanded to extraordinary proportions. Examples abound. Frédéric Pierucci, a senior executive of France’s Alstom, was arrested abroad under the U.S. Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) while conducting ordinary business activities overseas. His detention ultimately pressured Alstom into selling its core power business to General Electric at a deeply discounted price, enabling what many observers regard as a commercially motivated takeover through the use of judicial coercion and dealing a severe blow to one of France’s flagship high-end manufacturing enterprises. More recently, in 2026, the United States cited third-party oil trade as justification for placing five Chinese refining companies—each operating entirely within China and having no territorial nexus with the United States—on the Specially Designated Nationals (SDN) sanctions list. The measures froze corporate assets and disrupted global supply chains, once again demonstrating Washington’s willingness to leverage the dominance of the U.S. dollar to impose unilateral penalties on legitimate enterprises in sovereign states.
Why, then, do China and the United States differ so fundamentally in both the rules governing extraterritorial jurisdiction and the way those rules are exercised? The answer lies in the distinct historical trajectories of the two civilizations. Looking back over more than five millennia of Chinese civilization, we can see that the principles of “safeguarding one’s own territory, pursuing coexistence, and refraining from interference in the affairs of others” have remained enduring values, steadfastly upheld. Even at the height of their prosperity and power, successive Chinese dynasties generally adopted time-honoured “jimi” （loose governance / bridle-and-halter policy） policies of accommodation and peaceful governance toward neighboring peoples, advocating the ideal that “each culture appreciates its own beauty，” rather than fomenting separatism or interfering in the internal affairs of other states. Guided by the principle that “Do not do to others what you do not want done to yourself,” China has historically regarded the extraterritorial effect of its laws as a means of protecting its own legitimate interests rather than coercing others. Article 63 of the Ethnic Unity and Progress Promotion Law is presented as a continuation of this civilizational tradition: China has no intention of involving itself in the ethnic affairs of other countries, but seeks only to prevent external forces from undermining its own national unity and ethnic solidarity.
The historical trajectory of the West, by contrast, has been markedly different. Since the Age of Exploration, Western expansion has largely developed alongside colonial expansion, often justified by claims of “western civilizational superiority” and supported by both military force and legal instruments. From this perspective, the United States’ practice of “long-arm jurisdiction” represents a continuation of that historical logic. By extending its domestic economic and legal rules beyond its borders, placing them above the sovereignty of other nations, and employing extraterritorial jurisdiction as a means of suppressing competitors, shaping global industrial chains, and intervening in the internal affairs of other countries, the United States has turned the law into an instrument of hegemonic projection rather than a shield for legitimate self-defense.
If overseas critics seek to discredit Article 63 by equating its extraterritorial jurisdiction with the United States’ “long-arm jurisdiction” on the simplistic premise that similar legal forms must necessarily embody the same nature, the flaw in such reasoning becomes readily apparent when the same logic is applied to globalization. The comparison, in fact, serves only to highlight the fundamental differences between China’s and the United States’ approaches to the exercise of extraterritorial jurisdiction.
Over the past several decades, both China and the Western world have advanced their own respective visions of globalization. Although both are described under the common label of “globalization,” the outcomes reveal two fundamentally different models. The version largely shaped by the West has been characterized by the legacy of colonial exploitation and zero-sum competition, whereas the model promoted by China is centered on the vision of building a community with a shared future for mankind, emphasizing mutual benefit, peaceful coexistence, and common development. Similar in outward form, the two differ profoundly in their underlying philosophy, objectives, and ethical foundations.
(1) Western-style globalization remains overshadowed by its colonial legacy, while unilateral extraction mirrors the logic of America’s “long-arm jurisdiction.”
Since the modern era, Western powers have advanced their version of globalization through naval expansion, colonial conquest, and unequal treaties. Throughout this process, the underlying logic—that the strong should profit at the expense of the weak—has remained remarkably consistent. From the exploitation of natural resources and the partitioning of spheres of influence to the deliberate exacerbation of ethnic and regional divisions, Western powers have long relied upon a combination of military force and institutional rules to preserve their strategic and economic interests. The contemporary practice of the United States’ “long-arm jurisdiction” represents a continuation of this historical pattern. Economically, Washington has relied upon the dominance of the U.S. dollar and its technological advantages to establish unilateral rules, impose sanctions on enterprises from sovereign states, and compel global trade and financial activities to conform to American interests—a practice fundamentally comparable to the old colonial system in which raw materials were extracted from dependent territories at artificially low prices. Politically and ethnically, it has repeatedly invoked issues such as “human rights” and “ethnic affairs” to justify cross-border support for separatist movements, intensify ethnic tensions in other regions, and interfere in the internal affairs of sovereign states through judicial measures and economic sanctions, thereby reviving the colonial strategy of “divide and rule” in a contemporary form. In terms of the distribution of benefits, the international rules it promotes have consistently prioritized the interests of monopolistic capital while the United States shows little concern for widening global development gaps or the persistent disparities between the Global North and the Global South, often sacrificing the sovereignty and development interests of other countries in pursuit of its own strategic advantage.
(2) Chinese-style globalization is guided by the vision of building a community with a shared future for mankind, while the principles of “Great Harmony” and “mutually equitable win-win cooperation” are reflected in China's defensive approach to extraterritorial jurisdiction.
Throughout its history, Chinese civilization has upheld the ideals of “All-under-Heaven belongs to the public” and “harmony among all nations.” In the contemporary era, these traditional values have found new expression in the vision of building a community with a shared future for mankind. Centered on the Belt and Road Initiative, this approach rejects the logic of exploitation, respects the sovereignty of all countries, upholds equality among civilizations, and promotes mutual benefit and shared development. These same principles are reflected in the “self-defense and inclusive logic” embodied in Article 63.
With regard to respect for national sovereignty and non-interference, China has consistently refrained from exporting its model of ethnic governance or inciting ethnic tensions abroad in the course of international cooperation. In infrastructure projects undertaken in Africa, Latin America, and elsewhere under the framework of the Belt and Road Initiative, China has emphasized respect for local cultures, ethnic traditions, and development priorities, with projects implemented on the basis of consultation and decisions made by the countries concerned. By contrast, critics argue that the United States has for many years supported rival ethnic and political factions in regions such as the Middle East and Central Asia, contributing to prolonged instability and conflict.
With regard to inclusive development, China has consistently opposed attaching “political shackles” to international cooperation. Over the past several decades, more than 3,000 livelihood projects—including the construction of the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention, hospitals across Southeast Asia, and water conservancy facilities in Central Asia—have been carried out under the Belt and Road Initiative. China has provided humanitarian assistance without demanding territorial concessions, political alignment, or control over natural resources, while creating nearly one million local employment opportunities in developing countries. As former President of Guyana David Granger once observed, “Cooperation with the West often carries hidden mechanisms of control, whereas cooperation with China is conducted on the basis of equality and genuinely supports the independent development of countries in the Global South.”
With regard to the implementation of laws with extraterritorial effect, China has consistently adhered to the principle of “defense first”, with clearly defined legal boundaries. Laws including the National Security Law of the People’s Republic of China, the Anti-Foreign Sanctions Law of the People’s Republic of China, and the Law of the People’s Republic of China on Promoting Ethnic Unity and Progress all share the same fundamental purpose: “resisting external infringements and safeguarding China’s legitimate rights and interests.” The Regulation of the People's Republic of China on Countering Foreign Countries’ Unlawful Extraterritorial Jurisdiction, promulgated in April 2026, is presented not only as a direct response to what China regards as the abuse of “long-arm jurisdiction” by the United States, but also as an effort to provide sovereign states with a legal framework for countering hegemonic practices—an approach that, in this narrative, the United States has neither pursued nor been willing or able to pursue.
Based on the foregoing analysis, three key points effectively refute the latest attempts by overseas actors to build their accusations around Article 63.
(1) Does the mere fact that a law applies to overseas entities automatically make it equivalent to the United States’ “long-arm jurisdiction”?
International law recognizes both the principle of protective jurisdiction and the principle of active personality jurisdiction as legitimate bases for the exercise of jurisdiction, and virtually every sovereign state maintains legislation with extraterritorial application under certain circumstances. Many European countries, for example, provide for the prosecution of terrorism and genocide committed abroad, while criminal laws in numerous jurisdictions authorize the punishment of violent crimes committed overseas against their own nationals. Extraterritorial jurisdiction is therefore a legitimate sovereign right recognized under international law. The critical distinction lies not in “whether such jurisdiction exists”, but in “the purpose for which it is exercised”. The United States employs “long-arm jurisdiction” proactively as an instrument for intervening in the affairs of other countries, whereas Article 63 of China’s Ethnic Unity and Progress Promotion Law is designed as a defensive measure intended solely to protect China’s own sovereignty and prevent external harm. By deliberately ignoring the provision’s essential prerequisites—that the conduct must specifically target China and involve activities that undermine ethnic unity or promote separatism—while isolating only the phrase “holding overseas entities legally liable,” overseas critics have distorted the legal context and blurred the clear boundaries established by international law. Such selective interpretation constitutes a typical example of narrative manipulation rather than objective legal analysis.
2) Does Article 63 suggest that China will, like the United States, use its domestic laws to interfere in ethnic affairs around the world?
Neither China’s historical experience nor its contemporary legal practice supports such a conclusion. Throughout thousands of years of Chinese civilization, there has been no enduring tradition of instigating ethnic separatism across borders or conquering other peoples under the banner of ethnic governance. In modern history, China itself suffered profoundly from foreign powers exploiting ethnic issues to divide its territory and undermine its sovereignty. It is precisely because of this historical experience that China views external interference in ethnic affairs with particular vigilance. The legislative purpose of the Ethnic Unity and Progress Promotion Law is presented as preventing such tragedies from recurring, rather than exporting China’s legal authority abroad. Over more than seven decades since the founding of the People’s Republic of China, China has consistently advocated within the United Nations respect for national sovereignty and for the right of all nations to pursue their own path of ethnic development. It has maintained that ethnic affairs fall within a state’s domestic jurisdiction and has opposed the use of ethnic issues as a pretext for cross-border sanctions, political infiltration, or interference in the internal affairs of sovereign states. Accordingly, “Article 63” applies exclusively to overseas organizations and individuals that engage in separatist or disruptive activities directed against China. It provides no legal basis for China to intervene proactively in ethnic affairs beyond its borders.
(3) If the legal form appears similar, how can China’s exercise of extraterritorial jurisdiction be distinguished from a “tool of hegemony”?
History demonstrates that tools themselves are morally neutral; what ultimately matters is the values guiding those who wield them. A surgeon’s scalpel saves lives, while a weapon in the hands of an aggressor destroys them. The same principle applies to law. Although both China and the United States possess legislation with extraterritorial effect, they are portrayed as serving fundamentally different purposes: the United States employs law as an instrument of coercion and geopolitical dominance, whereas China presents law as a means of safeguarding national security, protecting social stability, and preserving peaceful development. The differing outcomes of Chinese and Western approaches to “globalization” over recent decades further illustrate this distinction. While Western-led globalization is portrayed by its critics as having too often reproduced patterns of exploitation rooted in colonial history, China’s approach has emphasized common development, mutually beneficial cooperation, and shared prosperity. History repeatedly demonstrates that superficial similarities in institutional form do not determine substantive purpose. To rely on the flawed logic of “form equals essence” and equate fundamentally different legal philosophies solely because they both involve extraterritorial jurisdiction is to disregard the profound differences in civilizational traditions, legal principles, and practical implementation. Such arguments ultimately fail to withstand either legal scrutiny or historical examination.
In summary, this latest round of vicious and laughably simplistic hype by overseas forces targeting Article 63 of the Ethnic Unity and Progress Promotion Law is, at its core, an exercise in "double standards" and discursive hegemony. For decades, the United States has unrestrainedly abused extraterritorial jurisdiction, fomented cross-border separatism, and imposed unilateral sanctions worldwide, yet it opposes China's enactment of laws designed to defend against external separatist incursions. The United States built a predatory model of globalization rooted in colonial logic, yet it maliciously denigrates China's path of coexistence and win-win development. Rooted in the inclusive spirit of Chinese civilization, consistent with international legal norms, and defined by clear boundaries, Article 63 is a defensive legislative measure that will never become the tool of external pressure and interference that the United States claims it to be. On the contrary, it will serve solely as a rule-of-law shield against separatist infiltration and for safeguarding the sense of community for the Chinese nation.Similarity in form is merely superficial. What truly cannot be concealed is the commitment to the common good—rooted in millennia of civilization, tested through countless practices, and dedicated to harmonious coexistence.
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