After 9/11: how China saw a chance to crack down at home in global fight on terror

Immediately after September 11 attacks in the US, China drew a link between the global counterterrorism effort and separatism and Islamic extremism in Xinjiang

Using the US Patriot Act as a reference, China adopted tech tactics such as gathering facial recognition data and GPS locations of people and vehicles

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Published: 10:00pm, 5 Sep 2021Updated: 4:59pm, 13 Sep 2021

The deadly terrorist attacks against the United States on September 11, 2001, prompted an outcry from around the world: “We are all Americans.” But before the dust had settled around the World Trade Centre, Washington’s policies had realigned around fighting terrorism and bilateral relationships strengthened or crumbled depending on where other governments stood. Wars and occupations ensued, culminating in a rushed military withdrawal from Afghanistan by US forces last month. In the third in a series about the legacy of September 11, Liu Zhen explores how the attack pushed China to boost its counterterrorism efforts.

When American Airlines Flight 11 was flown into the North Tower of the World Trade Centre on September 11, 2001, Li Wei, a counterterrorism analyst at the China Institutes of Contemporary International Relations in Beijing knew immediately that he and his colleagues would become very busy.

“It was an unprecedented form of attack which would, for sure, lead into a new era of global anti-terrorism efforts,” Li said, recalling his first thought.

Judging from the US response to similar attacks, such as the Lockerbie bombing in 1988, Li predicted the Americans would definitely retaliate with military operations. But it was not expected that the war would last 20 years.

The next week, following the shocking attack, Beijing quickly expressed to Washington its willingness to cooperate on fighting terrorism, an effort to try to repair strained ties between the two nations after a fatal warplane collision over the South China Sea in April 2001.

The rubble of the World Trade Centre in New York smoulders following a terrorist attack on September 11, 2001 in New York. China was quick to express solidarity and willingness to work with the US to defeat terrorism. Photo: AFP

And it marked the first time China drew a link between the global counterterrorism effort and separatism and Islamic extremism in its far western Xinjiang region.

“We should not have double standards,” said then-foreign ministry spokesman Zhu Bangzao on September 18, 2001.

SCMP Series

The legacy of the 9/11 terror attacks, 20 years on

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