Tehran, beijing mock washington over trump crisis

America’s adversaries were quick to pour scorn on the U. S. over the storming of the Capitol building, declaring it a symbol of the decline of a once-great nation. In comments that mixed criticism, glee and faux concern, they claimed it showed a U.S. democratic system in all-out crisis. Experts, meanwhile, said that autocratic regimes such as China would use it to warn their citizens of the perils of allowing protests. America’s arch-enemy Iran led the charge, with President Hassan Rouhani the first head of state to publicly comment on the rampage by Trump supporters. “What we saw in the United States ... shows above all how fragile and vulnerable Western democracy is,” Rouhani said. “A populist has arrived, and he has led his country to disaster over these past four years.” In China, state-owned Global Times made gloating comparisons with the scenes of protesters storming Hong Kong’s parliament in 2019. In Russia, officials compared them to those in Ukraine in 2014, when activists led protests that toppled elected president Viktor Yanukovych.