Sharp attack:Chinese academics and officials at a press conference regarding a report on the U.S. on Wednesday.AP  

China took the U.S. to task on Wednesday over racism, financial inequality and the federal government’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic, in an annual report that seeks to counter U.S. accusations of human rights abuses by China’s ruling Communist Party.

The 28-page report opens with “I can’t breathe”, a reference to George Floyd, a Black-American who was declared dead last May after a police officer pressed his knee against Floyd’s neck for about nine minutes.

The document also highlighted the January 6 attack on the Capitol, as well as gun violence and health disparities. China issues the report each year in response to U.S. criticism of its record on issues such as abuses against minority groups and a crackdown on opposition voices in Hong Kong.

“To defeat the epidemic requires mutual help, solidarity and cooperation among all countries. However, the United States, which has always considered itself an exception and superior, saw its own epidemic situation go out of control, accompanied by political disorder, inter-ethnic conflicts, and social division,” the report said.

‘Arbitrary sanctions’

Separately, China also hit out at the European Union on Wednesday, accusing it of “hypocrisy” after the two sides summoned each other’s envoys in an escalating row over the treatment of China’s Muslim Uyghurs.

France, Germany and other EU nations called in Chinese ambassadors to protest against sanctions imposed by Beijing targeting their citizens, including five members of the European Parliament and two EU bodies and two think-tanks. The sanctions were a tit-for-tat response after the EU, Britain and Canada blacklisted four former and current officials in China’s Xinjiang region.

“The EU ... arbitrarily imposes sanctions based on false information and lies, but does not allow the Chinese to talk back or fight back,” said foreign ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying. “This in itself is double standards, a manifestation of bullying and hypocrisy.”