US Capitol attack shakes the world
Katrin Bennhold
Jan 7, 2021 – 7.10pm
Berlin | As an angry mob stormed the heart of the world's most powerful democracy, the rest of the world watched the once-unimaginable scenes unfolding in Washington with dismay and disbelief – and deep concern about what the turmoil could mean as authoritarian forces gain strength around the globe.
Many of those following live broadcasts of armed rioters forcing their way into the US Capitol saw it as a stark and disturbing warning for all the world's democracies: If this can happen in the United States, it can happen anywhere.
Donald Trump supporters stormed the Capitol in a show of chaos that has stunned the world. Bloomberg
"We currently witness an attack on the very fundaments of democratic structures and institutions," said Peter Beyer, the German government's co-ordinator for trans-Atlantic affairs, who was watching the scenes from Washington on TV. "This is not merely a US national issue, but it shakes the world, at least all democracies."
The attack on the Capitol – coming less than a day after Hong Kong police arrested more than 50 democracy activists – was seen as a deep blow to America's global credibility on advocating liberal values that would make it harder for the United States to hold to account authoritarian leaders around the world.
The world's authoritarian leaders "must be in euphoric and celebratory mood", wrote Yossi Melman, a writer for Haaretz, the Israeli newspaper, mentioning by name President Vladimir Putin of Russia, President Xi Jinping of China, North Korean leader Kim Jong-un and Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. "The glorified democracy in the world is in shambles like a third world country."
As shocking as the violence was, some were not totally surprised that the Trump presidency was ending like this, in a spasm of chaos.
"This is what happens when you sow hatred," Stéphane Séjourné, a member of the European Parliament and close ally of President Emmanuel Macron of France, wrote on Twitter. "Let us defend and protect our democracy, because it cannot be taken for granted."
Several leaders directly blamed President Donald Trump for the violence.
"The peaceful transfer of power is the cornerstone of every democracy. A lesson once taught to the world by the USA," the German Vice-Chancellor, Olaf Scholz, wrote. "It is a disgrace that Donald Trump is undermining it by inciting violence and destruction."
Kremlin gloats, South Africa lectures
Jeremy Hunt, a Conservative former foreign secretary in Britain, said on Twitter that Trump "shames American democracy tonight & causes its friends anguish but he is not America".
Even some of Mr Trump's closest allies on the European populist right, including Nigel Farage, a leading Brexit supporter who campaigned for the American President, condemned the riot. "Storming Capitol Hill is wrong," Mr Farage wrote on Twitter. "The protesters must leave."
In Russia, the violence fit neatly into the Kremlin's propaganda narrative of a crumbling American democracy. Russia's state-controlled news channel, Rossiya-24, broadcast the chaos in the Capitol on a split screen: one side showing happy Orthodox Christmas festivities in Russia, the other the violent mayhem in Washington.
The official Turkish news agency urged "all parties in the US to use moderation, common sense to overcome this domestic political crisis", while President Nicolas Maduro of Venezuela took to state television dressed in a long white tunic to lecture his ministers on the virtues of democracy.
Iran's official media offered minute-by-minute updates highlighting Mr Trump's role in instigating the violence by making false claims about election fraud. On social media, some Iranians tweeted a famous line of poetry about karma from the Book of Kings about a hunter of zebras who is finally hunted down by the beast.
There was a whiff of schadenfreude in some parts of the world that have been on the receiving end of advice on good governance from Washington in recent decades.
"As Africa we call for Americans to respect democracy, to respect rule of law and allow for a peaceful transition to power," Mmusi Maimane, South Africa's former leader of the opposition, wrote on Twitter. "Follow the example of great democratic states like South Africa which respect outcomes of elections."
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