I disagree with the Biblical saying of Jesus: "let he without sin cast the first stone."

That would mean nobody or no country could call any other to account. The perfect is the enemy of the good. We imperfect humans can still make judgments. Has the country tried to compensate for wrongs it has committed? Has the country admitted wrongs it has committed? Is there a mechanism by which victims of those acts or their descendants can bring the perpetrators or those who benefited from their acts to account?

david f

I agree with you. People make judgments every day of their lives. They would not last long if they did not.

None of us are faultless and judging a person does
not define who they are. It defines who you are.

The United Nations came into being in 1945 shortly after
the end of World War II. The stated purpose was to bring peace
to all nations of the world. Of course this is not easy task
because no nation is willing to give up its sovereignty.
However - the world would be worse of without the UN - and the
Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

Regarding calling countries to account - let us not forget
the International Criminal Court ( ICC) which investigates
and where warranted, tries individuals charged with the
gravest crimes of concern to the international community:
genocide, war crimes, crimes against humanity and the
crime of aggression.

The Court participates in a global fight to end impunity, and
through international criminal justice, the Court aims to hold
those responsible accountable for their crimes and to help
prevent these crimes from happening again.

Paul asks: "can you give me a link to that accurate data? I'll have a look."

I already posted the link. Interesting that you rejected it without ever seeing it.

Here's more data from China that you will somehow conclude is CIA propaganda. Quite how the CIA got the Chinese Commerce Ministry to agree to support their propaganda is something one can only guess at. </sarc>

http://www.cnbc.com/2023/07/19/china-says-trade-faces-extremely-severe-situation-blames-geopolitics.html

PS they also use that word 'de-risking' that I advised above would become more prevalent over the next few years.

It doesn't matter SM, China has a much larger population and thus it's ability to get out of the situation it's in will be easier.
It will keep adding people to their middle class, while the west's middle class moves into poverty.
- Least of all the fact that China has a huge manufacturing base and has many things the world wants, is world leader in many if not most of the worlds technologies and the fact that western economies are sinking, while the developing world is growing fast, and abandoning the West.

America is going to be left with a lot of worthless dollars the world no longer wants or needs and will not be able to pay it's 1 trillion a year debt obligations, which it has already been going hat in hand to China with which whom it wishes to buy its US treasuries and fund it's debts.

The US is a house of cards, ready to crash down around its ankles.

Couldn't even defend Ukraine.
Has no chance of defending Taiwan.

I hear the blame game has started.
Ukraine blames the West for not supplying air-power
While the US blames Ukraine for not fighting with combined arms tactics the way it trained them to.
(Yet it would never do so without air superiority)
Problem was when Ukraine tried the US tactics, it took horrendous losses.

Told you all a year or two back the US was a toothless tiger.
Their economic outlook is not that much better.