Daniel. This is about 40 minutes. Hello, everyone and thank you for joining us in person here today at the Atlantic Council and virtually around the world. For the conference titled china and the Global South Development and influence in the shifting global order to better understand and respond to the impact across the global south. My name is dave shulman senior director of the Atlantic Councils global china hub that has the mission of devising solutions to the global challenges posed by the rise leveraged in the Atlantic Councils work on china across the 16 programs and centers. Its a true pleasure to kick off the conference on a topic that couldnt be more timely and which is controlled with two Big Questions around state of the International Order and its intensifying strategic competition as well as to the state of progress towards the goals across much of world as countries look to rebound from the pandemic and address massive infrastructure financing gaps and harness the benefits of emerging technologies. In recent years china has devoted significant resources to deepening engagement across much of the developing world or what is referred to as the global south. From the trillion dollar gold gd and brood initiative to the creation of new multilateral forums, conferences and summits china is portraying itself as a champion of hand for the global south and in many ways these efforts are paying off. China largest trading partner in the second largest for latin america and the caribbean. Fiftythree countries have joined the belt and initiative. There are of course political ramifications of deepening economic engagement. The only african country to recognize taiwan and since 2017, targeted investments in Central America have helped entice the dominican republic, el salvador and nicaragua to switch diplomatic recognitions from taiwan to the prc. Weve seen a similar story play out in the pacific ian ago, sixs recognized taiwan but that number has now been cut in half he has china deepened its economic and in some cases Political Security relationships with those nations with significant implications. Meanwhile in the middle east economic engagements into political and diplomatic influences. Last march beijing was credited with mediating a detente betwee■ and iran reshaping the regions politics. Now even as it maintains the traditional risk adverse approach to involvement the war and support for israel to bolster its narratives of the region and across theworld. Narratives that question the merits of the global order and democratic governments offeringg countries an alternative vision at the the world is undergoing changes unseen in a century. The consequences of beijings increasingly close ties across the diverse regions are magnified in multilateral forums like the United Nations where china has sought to rally the countries to defendrights recors efforts to transform the global order into one more suited to the rise under the Chinese Communist party. Over the next two days we will explore the renewed a strategic strategicfocus and engagement ie global south but we will spend the bulk of our time doing something that isnt done enough here in washington which is to take a nuanced look at developing countries perspectives on china and whether there engagement is helping them to achieve ambitious development goals. We will explore with the picture looks like across the domains from Tech Innovation and digital ecosystems to investments, debt and a trade to the rule of law and the information environment and much more. A benefiting from the participation of experts across africa, latin america the middle east and asia, we will explore how relations are playing out across the vast and diverse regions that make up the socalled global south. Im thankful to those of you that have traveled long hours to join us here in washington andkg bringing together your diverse perspectives we hope to listen and learn the circumstances in which they are truly benefiting from engagement, what is working and why and conversely, where the ties with china undermined the prosperity and sovereignty. And we will close the conference by discussing how the United States and its allies and partners can better engage the countries to benefit their citizens, present viable alternatives to ultimately ensure that the emerging strategic competition we are witnessing across the global self creates a more world. Im truly excited about what we have in store for the next two days. With the hub program here at the Atlantic Council that leverages the expertise across the of thet chinas Global Impact across the domains is now simply too pervasive to be understood without such a matrix approach. Im advantage of the unique collaborative model during the conference with regional experts from more than half of the Atlantic Council centers taking part and enlivening us on everything from the debt restructuring to china shaping informations ecosystems to the adoption of the Chinese Technology and standards to the export of surveillance tools and developing societies. Thank you to the colleagues across the council for your participation in this groundbreaking conference. A conference which id like to underscore is only possible to the Councils Partnership with Notre Dame University and with my friend and longtime collaborator. The coleader of the Global South Initiative and associate professor of politics at notre dames school of Global Affairs who i will introduce now. The research focuses on the political economy of chinas development and its foreign and the developing world particularly africa. Hes been a visiting faculty member at the university, peking university and nyu. He was a policy analyst of the u. S. China Economic Security review commission and a senior fellow for the American Foreign po since 2006. Before coming to notre dame in 2019, he was assistant professor of Public Affairs at the university of texas at austin. Over to you. Thank you. I appreciate the introduction. Its wonderful to be here with you today. And let me begin by saying the Global Initiative is transformative in that it is bringing together a Top Research University at notre dame with all of the benefits and all of the things that ce with that to a top ashington think tank to the policy jobs that gave was mentioning in the speech, so it does for the growth of the interests of both of the institutions and im proud to work with dave to be part of it because it is with the cgs i that we are going to be engaging with people in the conference and Going Forward throughout the global south unit working on issues in the global south and that is fundamental to the schoolbi forward as dean will talk about in a moment. But what i want to do is pry amicable of issues, put them on the table and then to discuss later its Pretty Amazing that we are talking about this in this environment because in 2007, the aas book called china and at the developing world, the strategy for the 21st century. We could barely find a publisher and when we did it was a twotone cover. I dont think we sold many of them and the town wasnt that interested so to see the interests that have come about is quite fantastic. And in some ways, we owe this to him because hes decided to make a change and instead of hiding, hes striving for the achievements. Part of the effort to strive fog the global self interest of the world in ways we havent seen before and so a lot of the development we have seen over the last decade because he made it so you decided he was going to strive for achievement and its under that rubric we have this tension developing between the United States and china and some have called it the new cold war. So its within this context that theyve become geo strategically important as well and that may be reminiscent in some ways of the ways they were important during the first cold war. However i would like to suggest that this is a different world we live in today. During the first cold war, the united sta■ltes found itself in proxy wars with the soviet union all around the globe in africa, angola, ethiopia in fact we fighting with the chinese but i dont believe that in the current world this current cold war if you are well is going to lead across the globe. The fact they are interested in the same or similar outcomes could be juxtaposed with russia in places like the african continent is more than willing to benefit from chaos. Pretty we dont come into conflict with each other has occurred in the first cold■3 war. This period has been under a time of great roi as we see the economy growing by leaps and bounds during this period and see in the population growing in this period we see them going out as the strategies as more and more. One of the questions that hangs over us today is well any of these continue. It is a different kind of country and 1. 4 billion. If the entire discussion is predicated on the fact■z we will see continued chinese growth, that would be wrong. Part of the discussion today is to not only look in the past but to understand what these new trends mean for chinas engagement in the global south. I hope that we can talk about this transition moment. I feel that we are in right now. And there is also one other thing i kind of want to adhere and this is my own view im interested to see what others say about the conference here today. But i see using but i would call relatively cynical methods in order to stoke antiamerican and antiwestern sentiment in the global south in ways that serve its own interests. I wondered if this is in an effort to wha we might call confirmation bias. Theres a lot of residual resentment because of colonialism. So its easy thought or twos come in and simply say that its bad, was bad and is bad now and that will serve their interest in terms of the competition with of the United States, but my question for the panelists many of whom have flown in from countries all around the world is is it serving the interest of countries in the global south to make a choice or are they better not served by engaging as many as they can end up benefiting from those relationships. Is this effort to split the world between more pro china and more u. S. Camps not antithetical to the interests of the global south at large. I dont want toecessarily say one way or another. Im very interested to hear from people who come to hear their views on this but i am concerned that we have a country in china which is an authoritarian state using the language of diversity, equity and progressives all around the world and i find it very interesting, fascinating and a somewhat troubling that people around the world havent recognized. So im very curious to hear from the panelists about their views on this particular issue and whether they believe that china is leading them down and whether or not it is the leader of the global south that it pretends to be. Those are a few preliminary comments that i want to put on the table. Without further ado, what i want to d is introduce the dean of the school of Global Affairs without whom we wouldnt be sitting here today and without whom i wouldnt be sitting here today. A professor of history at the university of notre dame and the ■o of 15 books. He was the founding dean of the school of Global Affairs finishing off the second term now and so is he may or nine yef history and he has led us from our birth pains to where we are now which is a Major College within the university, so im very pleased that hes come from south bend to introduce the conferen dont i introduce gene Scott Appleby to the podium. Thank you, josh. I think with those preliminary remarks we can adjourn the meeting now. [laughter] and enjoy the false spring outside. It would be a false spring. It might be real here in dc. I am really pleased to have the opportunity to thank the Atlantic Council for partnering with our school of Global Affairs on the china global sela very promising and exciting project designed as you know to understand and analyze and better respond to chinas strategic intentions, methods and ultimate political and economic influence in the global south. It is our mantra as a university we are a force for good though you may. In order to participate, we must engage beyond the classroom. The china global Self Initiative between the Atlantic Council and school is in example of what that engagement looks like. Over the course of the relatively brief life, we are currently in our mind or tenth year since im the founding at the 18th or 20th year by the way im counting it. Weve been keeping up over these ten years weve been keeping a of hiring worldrenowned scholars to staff the Interdisciplinary Research teaching and policy School Including from whom we just heard. He leads the discussion at collective plans to explore ever evermore intensively the presence in africa never losing sight along the way of the domestic drivers larger Foreign Policy complex and economic dimens o that presence. The notre dame more broadly, the asia experts from several disciplines, track and evaluate the numerous ways chinas rule across the influence is shaping the future of its own people as well as the International Order. At the school itself given the array of social sciences, legal scholars, ethicists, International Conflict mediators, engineers, historians, anthropologists and environmental governance experts that comprise the faculty we pay particular attention to the impact of chinas policy presence on questions to the Human Development and human security. Including poverty, sustainability, human rights, multilateral peace building conflict resolution and good2 governance. These are the areas of expertise we have some expertise already and we are building stronger faculty every year. There was a pretty good clip to continue but now the number is about 70. This is best done in collaboration between diplomats, policymakers, china experts and an array of related areas of specialization. Thats why i joined my colleagues participating in the coer the professor in celebrating this partnership from which we have already learned a great deal and by means of which we can further leverage the growing expertise last but not least, i think the Atlantic Council for hosting this remarkable confidence and d taking the lead and organizing it. Among my colleagues present is the professor that oversees the schools washington, d. C. Office which is just down the street. We look forward in the coming months to organizing a variety of events on china and the global south and to hosting the next major conference of this promising partnership. [applause] thank you. Now it is my honor to introduce the general to kick off the conference on behalf of the Atlantic Council. Distinguished fellow with of the Atlantic Councils Scowcroft Center for strategy and security. In 2022, general walters completed a distinguished 40 year activeduty career in the u. S. Air force has the supreme allied commander in europe and commander of u. S. European command. A supreme allied Commander Europe he led the transition out of afghanistan, insured the Health Crisis did not transform into the security crisis and led to natos military allies and partners through the organizaon the largest invasion of a european nation since world war ii. General walters, it is an honor to have you kick off the Conference Today on behalf of at over to you. On behalfftlantic council, it is my privilege to welcome all of you for this great gathering for the Global Health initiative. As all of you know, it is a strategic imperative to improve global integration in the diplomatic informational military and economic spectrums. The more we can get out of the strategic integration, the better our ability to promote our Democratic Values and from a firsthand experience firsthand experience perspective, i was able to see the Great Power Competition and play with respect to every single tidbit of information that came out of moscow was instantaneously received north a antithetic nexus reveals how fast its been in the 21st century and the dramatic need all of us have to be aware of what takes place in all dimensions across the entire globe. So on behalf of the atlanti aree all of you for this gathering and welcome. [applause] moving right along its my pleasure to introduce the keynote speaker. Daniel was assistant secretary of state for east asia and Pacific Affairs as he has been since september of 2021. Hes a career member of the Foreign Service out of the rank of minister. He haserved as the senior director of the National Security council from 2015 to 201