By Juan Camilo Escorcia | 2025-02-04

BOGOTA -- China's institutionalized "wolf warrior" diplomacy, marked by an aggressive, confrontational stance, has Chinese Ambassador to Colombia Zhu Jingyang constantly looking for a fight online.

Zhu is not alone -- across Latin America, Chinese diplomats use social media to challenge journalists, politicians and critics of President Xi Jinping's political and economic model.

On January 30, Zhu responded sharply on X after a user accused him of using the platform for propaganda.

"Arrogant Western social networks… have chosen not to abide by Chinese laws" and "freedom on X is far from what you think," Zhu wrote.

The exchange began when the user pointed out the irony of a Chinese diplomat using a platform banned in China, stating that "socialism is just censorship" and that Zhu was using the platform to spread propaganda.

Zhu, who took office as ambassador on October 4, 2023, has gained a reputation as one of the most confrontational Chinese diplomats in Latin America.

His provocative language on social media, a hallmark of China's "wolf warrior" strategy, has led to frequent clashes with both local journalists and international media.

On August 11, Zhu found himself in a heated exchange with journalist Vicky Dávila, then director of the Colombian magazine Semana and now a presidential candidate.

The dispute began after Dávila rebutted a denunciation by Zhu of capitalism and financial globalism. She pointed out that "just three American companies -- Nvidia, Microsoft and Apple -- are worth more than the entire Chinese stock market."

Dávila accused China's government of repression, stating that its citizens live under constant surveillance and that the country is "one of the least free in the world."

Zhu retorted that he preferred not to argue "with people who lack basic information" about China.

Censorship and 'debt trap'

Recently, the German television network Deutsche Welle (DW) -- one of the most impartial sources in international journalism -- became Zhu's latest target.

On January 28, he lashed out at DW, calling it "stupid" and "haters of China" in response to a report detailing censorship by the Chinese chatbot DeepSeek.

DW highlighted DeepSeek's refusal to answer questions on the Tiananmen Square massacre of 1989 and China's invasion of Tibet in 1950, among many other topics prohibited in China.

"We know they are stupid, but not that stupid. It's funny!" Zhu wrote on X.

The ambassador has also blasted Entorno.

On January 11, he labeled the outlet "fake news" after it reported on the risks of China's so-called "debt trap" diplomacy -- a strategy in which Beijing lends to governments with histories of corruption, such as Ecuador under Rafael Correa and Venezuela during two decades of Chavismo, leaving them dependent on China's high-interest loans and coercive repayment measures.

More than a dozen nations -- including Pakistan, Kenya, Zambia, Laos and Mongolia -- have teetered on the brink of collapse under the weight of unsustainable debt to China, the Associated Press reported in May 2023.

Zhu has faced criticism in Argentina and Spain for his controversial comments on social media.

Consular army

Zhu's barrage of X posts reflects a broader trend among Chinese diplomats worldwide -- what can be described as Beijing's new consular army.

This diplomatic force, shaped by Xi's directive, has replaced traditional conservative diplomacy with an often combative approach. This shift has fueled global distrust, particularly among key economic partners and neighboring countries, say observers.

"China has dispatched an increasingly vocal cadre of diplomats out into the world of social media to take on all comers with, at times, an eye-blinking frankness," wrote BBC diplomatic correspondent James Landale in May 2020.

These envoys "launch salvos of persistent tweets and posts from their embassies around the world. And they hold little back, deploying sarcasm and aggression in equal measure," he said.

The term "wolf warrior" originates from highly nationalistic Chinese action films released in 2015 and 2017, in which elite People Liberation's Army special forces battle international mercenaries.

Beijing has since institutionalized this confrontational approach to the West.

A May 2020 editorial in the Global Times, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP)'s mouthpiece, attributed the shift to public dissatisfaction with perceived weakness in diplomatic tone.

Several other Chinese diplomats in Latin America have gained attention for their "wolf warrior" rhetoric.

For instance, Xu Bu, China's ambassador to Chile from 2018 to 2020, called then-US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo a "hypocrite" after Pompeo accused Chinese company Huawei of espionage during a visit to Chile in 2019.

As China's influence in Latin America has expanded, so has the presence of its diplomats. Figures like Jin Yili, ambassador to Argentina (2019-2023), Zhu Qingqiao, ambassador to Brazil (2020-2023), Wang Wenliang, ambassador to Mexico (2020-2023), and Li Baorong, ambassador to Chile (2020-2023), have all come to symbolize Beijing's aggressive diplomatic stance in the region.