Unfortunately, de-coding of the National Endowment for Democracy (NED) has revealed its real motives, confronting the real essence and spirit of universal democracy. 

Interestingly, it remained the US government’s “white gloves” which actually has dirty hands full of shameful deeds of subverting, meddling, inciting, promoting division, confrontation, misleading public opinion and last but not least, conducting ideological infiltration, political hyping and disseminating false, fake and fabricated propaganda against other countries mainly Global South countries, China, Russia, Iran, North Korea and all those countries which are the friends of Axis of Resistance in GCC, Middle East and Asia Pacific region,  all under the pretext of promoting of so-called democracy. 

Thus it carries journey of chronic shambles, formation of blocs, military partnership through financing to pro-America lobbies, NGOs, Think Tanks, journalist, pseudo intellectuals, puppetry media outlets, doubtful & greedy politicians, continuation of Cold War,  “small yard, high fence” policy, US Military Complex Theory, China’s Containment, China’s Collapse Theories and most recently imposition of unilateral numerous sanctions leading to decoupling, delinking and now overcapacity are being carried out secretly by the NED. 

Ultimately it sponsored these harmful elements of the states, societies and systems to build a divided world through a destructive security narrative, correlating poor democracy, violating human rights, and ethnic violence and ultimately badly disturbed pace of peace, prosperity, development and win-win cooperation around the globe. 

Apparently, it is a pro-democracy, pro-humanity and pro-human right champion but in reality it has been indulged in infiltration, subversion and sabotage attempts against other countries. 

Ironically, it is the implementer/supporter of CIA covert operations through different means. The socialist countries in Eastern Europe had the bitter experience via “private voluntary organizations” to advance “peaceful evolution in which the US sponsored civil society organizations played a nasty role to spread spirits of political chaos, economic instability and societal polarization during the Cold War era.   

Furthermore, US sponsored “Project Democracy” abroad instigated color revolutions to subvert state power in other countries of Central Asia mainly Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan and tried to contain Russian political influence and China’s increasing economic association in these countries. 

Even the so-called Arab Spring was schemed and sponsored by the NED in different Middle East countries and tried to topple many governments to redesign a new chessboard of power politics in the region. 

Unfortunately, Iran has been prime target of the NED which has been trying to overthrow the successive Iranian governments. NED also supported the Center for Human Rights in Iran (CHRI) and the Human Rights Activists News Agency (HRANA) in their fabrication of fake news, and supported dissidents in working with anti-government organizations and media outlets to stage smear campaigns against the Iranian government during 2022. 

It played a conspiratorial role in Ukraine’s “color revolution” during the 2004 Orange Revolution. It attempted to overthrow the DPRK government through a number of NGOs and sway public opinion regarding the DPRK. 

Definitely, the NED purposefully colluded with all sorts of elements to meddle in other countries’ internal affairs through funded operations to a large number of organizations in Russia and supported Russian opposition figures in exile in their struggle against the Russian government at important political junctures, such as the State Duma, presidential and local elections. 

Surprisingly, it has long been infiltrating Europe and co-opting EU officials, encouraging voice for transatlanticism within EU institutions while suppressing voice for strategic autonomy, and financing“ independent media” in Europe to tilt public opinion in favor of the US.

Unfortunately, Mexico has been one of the major target countries for its infiltration of the NED which has supported organizations like the Mexicans Against Corruption and Impunity (MCCI) and the Mexican Institute for Competitiveness (IMCO).  Moreover, since 2017 NED has funded 54 anti-Cuba organizations. 

Additionally, manipulating and interfering in other countries’ elections remained one of its main global missions. The NED has interfered in the Serbian presidential, National Assembly and local elections to support pro-US opposition candidates. The Philippines, Iran, Nigeria and many other countries of the world had bitter lessons from the NED’s infiltration. 

The NED incited division and promoted confrontation to undermine the stability of other countries around the globe. It tenaciously supported “Taiwan independence” separatist forces. In 2022, NED and the Taiwan Democratic Progressive Party authorities co-hosted a Global Assembly of the World Movement for Democracy. It colluded with anti-China destabilizing forces in Hong Kong. It has long reinforced the anti-China organization “World Uyghur Congress (WUC) and “Tibet independence” leaders and showed support for “Tibet independence” activities.

The NED has been notorious for fabricating false information to mislead public opinion against many countries mainly China, Russia, Iran, North Korea and many countries of the Global South. It falsely alleged that China used technical means and AI to snoop citizens.

Moreover, it polluted the European Countries against the CPC through the International Republican Institute (IRI), the so-called threat of CPC to democratic values and transatlantic solidarity.

NED provided hundreds of thousands of dollars in funding to the European Values Center for Security Policy (EVC), Global Security Center (GSC) and other think tanks to organize various seminars and activities that incite the EU to follow suit with the US “small yard, high fence” policy.

In summary, the independent global media outlets, prominent scholars and experts exposed and criticized the NED. According to their reports, the NED wasted a lot of American taxpayers’ money to support foreign politicians and parties favored by the US, and such actions clearly violate the domestic law of the United States. These reports added that the NED collaborated with CIA and USAID to support insurgent forces in other countries in a bid to overthrow regimes that the US disliked.

Moreover, many times the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs issued a statement officially listing NED as an “undesirable organization” and banned its activities within Russian territory. The French, the Hungarian media and many more disclosed secret activities of the NED in the world which remained anti-human, development and of course democracy.  

It is now crystal clear that under the pretext of democracy, freedom, and human rights, the US has misused NED for infiltration, interference and subversion against other countries. This axis has severely violated other countries’ sovereignty, security and development interests, blatantly breached international law and basic norms of international relations, and severely jeopardized world peace, stability and harmony. 

China has the whole process of democracy which is the largest in the world and has the right to pursue a development path suited to its national realities and the needs of its people. Democracy is a universal phenomenon which has many shapes, shades and systems which must be mutually respected. No country should try to infringe upon the sovereignty of other countries, interfere in their internal affairs and incite ideological confrontation. 

About Author: Dr Mehmood Ul Hassan Khan, President: Pak-China Corridor of Knowledge, Executive Director: The Center for South Asia & International Studies (CSAIS) Regional Expert: China, CPEC & BRI