Beijing has been threatening Hong Kong's autonomy with plans to increase restrictions and take control of the independent city. The United States has expressed its objective of protecting Hong Kong's rights from being removed.
President Donald Trump has taken actions meant to penalize the Chinese capital in its inappropriate actions against Hong Kong. The move is expected to increase the tension between China and America amid consistent arguments related to the coronavirus pandemic.
Informal separation
On Friday, President Trump announced that the United States would be withdrawing from the World Health Organization (WHO, which results in the suspension of entry of Chinese nationals. The parties are considered to be security risks to scientific research of the US and threaten Chinese companies on US markets, as reported by the Wall Street Journal.
Trump had previously stated that the WHO was unsuccessful in upholding its objectives and must be held responsible.
He added that the organization supported China in its attempt at misinforming the world regarding the coronavirus, which allegedly led to the broader outbreak of the disease.
The United States has been the forefront in donations to the WHO with a contribution of more than $400 million in 2019, which accounted for approximately 15% of its overall budget, according to Reuters.
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Critics of the decision
Global health experts deemed Trump's decision to withdraw from the organization as a dangerous move.
Dr Howard Koh, former assistant secretary for health during the administration of Ex-President Obama, said: "This decision is really so short-sighted and ill-advised, and all it does is put American lives at risk."
According to NPR, Senator Lamar Alexander, the chairman of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee disagrees with the decision of the US president. Alexander added that the withdrawal could interfere with clinical trials which are essential to vaccine development that is sorely needed around the world amid present conditions.
The former head of the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), Dr. Tom Frieden, said that the US assisted in the foundation of the WHO and that if America turns its back on the organization, it is turning its back on the world.
"Every country in the world has a veto at WHO, except now, perhaps the United States will not," he added.
The director of the O'Neil Institute for National and Global Health Law at Georgetown University, Larry Gostin, said the move is an overreach of Trump's constitutional powers. Gostin believes that the president would need the approval of Congress to push with his withdrawal from the WHO.
A professor of public health at Simon Fraser University, Kelley Lee, said that Trump could only make this decision if Congress had agreed beforehand to give the president the powers to do so.
Lee added that legal advisers are supposed to inform the president of what he is allowed to do with his authority and that the events suggest he is either not receiving any useful advice or merely ignorant to them.
Goslin said that Congress could sue Trump in federal court over the decision but also noted that the funding would still be suspended until the courts agree on a resolution.
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