a group of senior lawmakers from eight democracies including the us have launched a new crossparliamentary alliance to help counter what they say is the threat chinas growing influence poses to global trade security and human rightsthe interparliamentary alliance on china which launched friday comes as the us struggles to muster a cohesive alliance to take on chinas growing economic and diplomatic clout and as it leads foreign governments in condemning beijings move to impose national security legislation on hong kong that threatens the citys autonomythe group said it aims to construct appropriate and coordinated responses and to help craft a proactive and strategic approach on issues related to the peoples republic of china us republican senator marco rubio and democrat bob menendez former japanese defense minister gen nakatani european parliament foreign affairs committee member miriam lexmann and prominent uk conservative lawmaker iain duncan smith are all cochairs of the newly launched groupchina under the rule of chinese communist party represents a global challenge rubio a frequent critic of beijing and supporter of us legislation targeting china over its actions in hong kong said in a video message on twitterbeijing has repeatedly stressed that the situation in hong kong is an internal matter while saying chinas broader economic and diplomatic expansion poses no threat to the worldwe urge a small number of politicians to respect facts respect the basic rules of international relations abandon a cold war mentality stop interfering in domestic affairs and making political moves for selfish interests chinese foreign ministry spokesman geng shuang told a regular news briefing in beijing fridaygreat costthe alliance said chinas economic rise is putting the global rulesbased order under pressure and that countries that have tried to stand up to beijing have mostly done so alone and often at great cost the list of participating nations includes the us germany uk japan australia canada sweden norway as well as members of the european parliamentseveral of those nations have faced intense economic or political consequences for crossing chinas strategic ambitionsthe trump administrations assertive efforts to rewrite the bilateral trade relationship with china have prompted a protracted trade war that has had global consequences while other efforts have seen us journalists ejected from chinacanada saw two of its citizens michael kovrig and michael spavor detained without trial as a result of the arrest of a chinese huawei technologies co executive norway saw trade relations with china derailed for six years and salmon exports plummet after a chinese dissident was awarded the nobel peace prizeaustralias efforts to hold china accountable for the covid19 pandemic which first broke out in the mainland city of wuhan have led to new tariffs on australian barley and bans on some meatthe time has come for democratic countries to unite in a common defense of our shared values smith the uk lawmaker said on twitter