China would rather be feared than defied

CHINA HAS an anger-management problem, at least when dealing with small and mid-size Western democracies. The fate of Lithuania, a European Union member on the shores of the Baltic Sea, is a case in point.

The country is being punished for agreeing that Taiwan, a democratic island that China claims as its own territory, may open a “Taiwanese Representative Office” in Vilnius, Lithuania’s capital. China calls that an affront to its sovereignty. It has summoned its ambassador, Shen Zhifei, home for consultations, and told Lithuania to recall its envoy, Diana Mickeviciene. In a covid-era twist, China informed Ms Mickeviciene of her fate as she returned to Beijing from a summer break. She has to complete three weeks of strict quarantine at her residence and, after emerging on August 31st, catch the next flight home. State media suggest that China may soon suspend direct rail-freight services to Lithuania, then sever other economic links with that country of 2.8m people (Lithuanian farmers should forget long-held dreams of selling milk to China, it is hinted). In a detail noted with dismay by foreign envoys in Beijing, Lithuania’s embassy has received a barrage of threatening calls, many targeting local Chinese staff.