Washington (AFP)

Donald Trump is criticized from all sides in the United States for his apparent benevolence towards China in the unprecedented crisis shaking Hong Kong.

The US president confirmed Tuesday, based on information from US intelligence services, that the Chinese army was deployed "on the border with Hong Kong."

Videos broadcast by the Chinese official media had already shown forces massing near the semi-autonomous region, in what appeared as a way for Beijing to accentuate the threat of intervention in the face of pro-democracy protests that 'chained since early June.

But if he renewed his calls for "everyone" to remain "calm and safe," Donald Trump did not send an explicit warning to the Chinese authorities.

"I hope there will be a peaceful solution" and that "no one will be killed", he added, while some of the protesters are more and more virulent and the clashes with the police multiply.

The former British colony is experiencing its worst crisis since its return to Beijing in 1997.

Yet the Trump administration, engaged for months in a direct confrontation with China on trade, diplomatic-military competition in Asia-Pacific or human rights, has so far been very discreet. So much so that some observers are asking, without specifying, whether the Republican billionaire is not ready to turn a blind eye to a possible Chinese crackdown in exchange for a breakthrough in trade negotiations.

The president in his seventies has just estimated, in early July, that the demonstrators were "in search of democracy."

But Washington dismissed China's accusations of interference as "ridiculous", and instead took care not to take sides, calling on "all parties to refrain from violence".

- "Green light" -

President Trump has even issued a congratulation to his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping, whom he said in late July that he had "acted responsibly". The crisis is "between Hong Kong and China because Hong Kong is part of China," he then insisted in early August, he is usually quick to distribute the good and bad points, including his closest allies.

Is the message firmer in private? Hard to say. If the head of the American diplomacy Mike Pompeo met Tuesday in New York the highest official of the Chinese Communist Party for foreign policy, Yang Jiechi, the State Department did not want to divulge the content of the interview, which had not been announced in advance.

As a result, according to Donald Trump, in another tweet published on Tuesday, many critics accuse him of being responsible for "the current problems in Hong Kong". "I wonder why?", He added.

"He gave Xi the go-ahead," Thomas Wright of the Brookings Institution think tank told him, also on Twitter, denouncing the "worst foreign policy decision of his presidency".

Nicholas Burns, former US ambassador now a professor at Harvard, also accused him of lacking "courage" in supporting "both sides". "The United States should be on the side of one side, that of democratic rights for the people of Hong Kong," he said, in unison with many experts or elected officials.

Political side too, indeed, Republicans as Democrats multiply statements of support to the protesters and warnings against Beijing, which appear hollow as so many criticisms about the discretion of the administration.

"The United States, and all freedom-loving nations around the world, must stand ready to act swiftly to defend freedom if China engages in an escalation of the Hong Kong conflict," warned the Republican senator Rick Scott.

His colleague Lindsey Graham, who often has the ear of Donald Trump, added: "30 years after Tiananmen Square", where the Chinese army ended in 1989 the pro-democracy movement, killing hundreds, " all Americans support peaceful protesters in Hong Kong ". "This is a pivotal moment for US-China relations," he insisted.

© 2019 AFP