There have been plenty of hypocritical statements by foreign ministry spokesmen over the years. Russia’s protestations that it wants peace in Ukraine ring hollow, and Iran’s claims that it has nothing to do with unrest in the Middle East don’t sound convincing.

And yet, even by the low standards of the genre, China’s official mouthpiece hit a fresh low last week with its complaints that the forced sale of the social media app TikTok violated free and fair competition between open markets. From the country that has banned Facebook, X (formerly Twitter), YouTube and many others, the hypocrisy was stunning.

“In the end, this will inevitably come back to bite the United States itself.“: China’s Foreign Ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin.Credit: AP

The US would be quite right to demand it be sold. If the bill passes the Senate, China will be forced to either open up its own markets, or else accept that its multinationals won’t be able to expand globally – and would be an improvement on the blatantly rigged market we have right now.

If it happens it is going to be a huge sale, and one that will reshape the social media industry. With 1.7 billion users globally, Byte Dance’s TikTok is by far the most successful new internet product of the past decade. Last week the US House of Representatives decided on national security grounds that the company could no longer be allowed to operate in the country while it was controlled from China.

With a value estimated at $US40 billion to $US50 billion ($61 billion-$76 billion) – potentially much more given that digital properties of its value don’t come along very often – a forced divestment will be the biggest deal of the year.

A consortium of investors might take control – Donald Trump’s former Treasury secretary Steve Mnuchin is reported to be already putting together an investor group – or if the regulators will allow it, Amazon, Apple or Facebook’s owner Meta would be keen to buy it. Whatever happens, it will reshape the global web industry, with TikTok’s new American-approved owner joining the tech big league.

The Chinese government is complaining angrily about that. “This kind of bullying behaviour that cannot win in fair competition disrupts companies’ normal business activity, damages the confidence of international investors in the investment environment, and damages the normal international economic and trade order,” according to its spokesman Wang Wenbin. “In the end this will inevitably come back to bite the United States itself.”

Well, perhaps. And yet the Chinese government is hardly in a position to accuse anyone else of unfair competition. This is a country where X, YouTube, Facebook, WhatsApp, Google and Instagram are all blocked from operating.