标签： Asia

On April 13, 2026, during the second day of his five-day official visit to China — his fourth trip to the country since taking office — Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez delivered a landmark address to faculty, students and university administrators at Beijing’s Tsinghua University, where he laid out a clear call for global leaders to embrace an emerging multipolar world order and reject outdated, dangerous zero-sum geopolitical thinking.

Opening his argument with a centuries-old historical lesson, Sanchez drew on the experience of 16th-century Jesuit missionary Matteo Ricci, who arrived in China in 1583 carrying a European-produced world map that placed Europe at the center of the globe and pushed Asia to its geographic periphery. When Chinese cartographers questioned the lopsided framing that placed China on the margins, Ricci redrew the map with the Pacific Ocean at its center, a reworking that Sanchez framed as a timeless lesson for modern geopolitics.

“Four hundred years have passed, but unfortunately, there are still people who see the world through that original, distorted map,” Sanchez told the Tsinghua audience. “That view is not only wrong, but very dangerous. It traps us in the past and limits our imagination of possibilities.”

Sanchez emphasized that the current global shift is not a simple transfer of hegemonic power from one bloc to another, but a broad expansion of global multipolarity that touches both geopolitical influence and shared prosperity. Today, he noted, dynamic progress is unfolding simultaneously across regions with distinct cultural traditions and political systems — from China to Africa to Latin America — without requiring validation or permission from any single dominant power.

“A multipolar world is not an assumption or an ideal, but a new reality. We cannot change it; we can only deny it or embrace it,” Sanchez said, confirming that Spain has made the deliberate choice to embrace this new reality with realism, a sense of shared responsibility, and optimistic hope for the future. He added that if Spain, China and Europe built shared prosperity in past decades, there is no reason the three actors cannot replicate that success in the modern era.

Acknowledging that differences and healthy competition exist between nations, Sanchez stressed that lasting human progress stems from building common ground rather than deepening existing divides. He outlined that Spain seeks a bilateral relationship with China rooted in unwavering mutual respect: cooperating on shared global priorities whenever possible, competing constructively when necessary, and managing unavoidable differences through deliberate, respectful dialogue.

To help a multipolar world order function effectively and equitably, Sanchez proposed three core actionable priorities for global leaders. First, he called for a fundamental reshaping of modern multilateralism, advocating for comprehensive United Nations reform that would expand the authority of the UN General Assembly, increase the representativeness of the UN Security Council, and build a more inclusive, democratic global decision-making mechanism.

Second, Sanchez highlighted the urgent need to build fair, reciprocal global trade relations, expressing hope that China would continue expanding market access to help address existing trade imbalances across global markets. Third, he stressed that major global powers bear a greater responsibility to address shared transnational challenges, including climate change mitigation, global public health, artificial intelligence governance, nuclear nonproliferation and safety, and global poverty eradication. He noted that global investment in these critical areas has fallen by 23% since the start of 2026, a trend that puts all nations at risk.

Sanchez also underscored the critical role of a unified European Union in maintaining global stability, noting that “Without a united EU, there will be no stable global order, just as without China’s participation, the world cannot achieve true stability and prosperity.”

Closing his address, Sanchez invoked a recent image of four NASA astronauts observing Earth from outer space: a single, borderless blue planet that is unique and irreplaceable. “Humanity itself is a miracle, the only miracle in the world. Our responsibility is to make this miracle continue through mutual understanding and cooperation,” he said.

A deeply divisive bill that would impose sweeping new criminal penalties on a wide range of speech related to Israel is currently moving through France’s national parliament, triggering fierce public backlash and reigniting long-simmering debates over the boundaries of political expression in the country.

The legislation, scheduled for its first reading in the National Assembly on April 16, has already earned unusual cross-party support, with backing even from far-right political factions. But the broad political consensus behind the bill has not quelled public opposition: more than 500,000 people have signed a public petition demanding the legislation be scrapped, and organized protests against the measure have spread across multiple French cities as critics warn it poses an unprecedented threat to core free speech protections.

The proposal is the brainchild of sitting French MP Caroline Yadan, a prominent lawmaker who publicly identifies as an “unconditional” supporter of Israel. Yadan represents the 8th constituency for French citizens living overseas, a district where Israeli residents make up a substantial share of the voting electorate, and she has centered her entire political tenure on advancing policies that defend Israeli actions and interests. She has already openly broken with French President Emmanuel Macron over his official recognition of the Palestinian people’s right to statehood, and publicly condemned Macron in October 2024 after the president called for a halt to French weapons deliveries to Israel amid Israel’s ongoing military campaign in Gaza. Yadan, who is Jewish, has defended the bill with an unsubstantiated claim that “For fifteen years, Jews have been killed in France ‘in the name of Gaza.’”

If enacted, the bill would introduce a series of far-reaching new criminal offenses. It would make it a crime to deny Israel’s right to exist, and explicitly criminalize comparisons between the Israeli state and Nazi Germany — a legal protection that is not extended to France itself. The legislation also expands existing terrorism-related statutes to cover what the text labels “implicit” provocation, broadening the definition of “apology for terrorism” to include the “minimising or trivialising” of terror attacks.

Under the bill’s first article, anyone found guilty of speech interpreted as justifying or reframing acts designated as terrorism could face up to five years in prison and substantial financial fines. This broad language could even criminalize framing such acts as “resistance,” or providing contextual background that courts deem insufficiently condemnatory. Critics note the new wording would allow courts to treat attempts to explain the political root causes of violence as criminal acts, opening the door to widespread prosecution of dissenting political speech.

Marc Trevidic, a former French anti-terrorism judge, has issued a sharp public warning about the dangerous implications of the bill’s vague wording. “Implicit provocation to terrorism: do you realize what that means? Becoming a censor of other people’s thoughts, trying to guess what a person really meant,” Trevidic said.

One high-profile provision expands existing French laws on crimes against humanity, explicitly classifying any comparison between Israel and Nazi Germany as “outrageous trivialization” of the Holocaust, a criminal offense under the new legislation. The bill’s preamble makes its core intent unambiguous: it explicitly states that framing the Israeli state as equivalent to the Nazi regime must be treated as a criminal act, effectively shielding Israel from one of the most politically charged forms of criticism directed at the country’s policies.

The legislation builds on France’s already strict existing speech regulations, which have criminalized Holocaust denial under the 1990 Gayssot Act for decades. But legal experts and free speech advocates note the new measures go far beyond existing prohibitions, extending criminal liability into a broad swathe of mainstream political expression. As the first parliamentary vote approaches, the clash between the bill’s cross-party backers and mass public opposition has put France’s commitment to free expression under unprecedented national scrutiny.