SINGAPORE - The United States seeks an ideological approach to world order, while China seeks a secular one based on national sovereignty and territorial integrity.

This requires countries to not interfere in other countries' internal affairs, and to respect one another, said Professor Jia Qingguo from the Institute for Global Cooperation and Understanding at Beijing's Peking University.

But China's vision for the international order is that countries must show deference to Chinese interests, countered Ms Bonnie Glaser, director of the Asia Programme at the German Marshall Fund, a United States think-tank.

"We should be a little cautious in understanding what respect means. Because when countries have put their own interests ahead of Chinese interests, that has been interpreted by Beijing as disrespect, and you know how many countries have been targeted with economic coercion, political punishment because they didn't respect Chinese interests," she said, citing as examples Japan, Australia, Lithuania, Canada and "many other countries".

Ms Glaser and Prof Jia - who is also a member of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, a top advisory body in China - were participating in a virtual panel on Friday (May 27) at The Future Of Asia, an annual global conference organised by Japanese media group Nikkei.

Singapore's former top diplomat Bilahari Kausikan was the other panellist at the session, which produced largely polite but at times trenchant exchanges between the American analyst and the Chinese academic as they debated the impact of the ongoing Russian invasion of Ukraine on US-China relations and the international order.

Mr Kausikan, who now chairs the Middle East Institute at the National University of Singapore, said Prof Jia had made a valid point in distinguishing the US' ideological approach with China's secular one.

Insisting on defining global shifts in an overly ideological way - for instance, as a conflict between authoritarianism and democracy - could dilute support for the West in Asia, where there is an ambivalence about such terms, Mr Kausikan said.

"Countries in Asia do understand what is at stake in Ukraine, and that's why you have seen, by and large, most countries give what support they can to the West," he explained. "(But) not every country in this region finds every aspect of Western democracy universally attractive, nor does it find every aspect of, say, Chinese authoritarianism universally abhorrent.

"The world is a much more complex place," the ex-ambassador added. "Better to focus on the interests involved. I think that's easier to understand for everybody and easier to sustain over the long run."

Mr Kausikan said the Russia-Ukraine conflict has generally swung global favour in the direction of the West - something "China cannot be very happy about" - and pointed to the US-led Indo-Pacific Economic Framework (IPEF) as putting Washington in not a bad position.

The 14-country trade initiative, launched earlier this week, intends to establish common standards in areas like supply-chain resilience and clean energy and is part of US efforts to counter China's growing regional influence. IPEF is unlikely to include binding commitments, and some countries and experts have expressed scepticism.

"I was very pleasantly surprised that so many countries, despite significant ambiguities still, signed on to IPEF," said Mr Kausikan. "It recognises that the US is an irreplaceable part of any strategic equation in this part of the world."

Prof Jia, however, said it was an "appearance" that the West was gaining strength in the wake of the war in Ukraine.

"The West has a lot of problems mostly not caused by others but by themselves at home," he said, arguing that US President Joe Biden came up with IPEF as an alternative to missing out on the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP) trading bloc.

"Nobody knows whether the next administration would take it over. How do we expect other countries to support it wholeheartedly?" said Prof Jia. "At the political level, at the diplomatic level, you pay tribute to it. But the problem is whether it can be enforced in the long run."

Asked to elaborate on his notion of ideological and secular world orders, he said the US was classifying and dealing with countries on the basis of values; while China believes that no country should be an exception to operating under the United Nations charter and international law.

"The US often talks about a rules-based order, but the problem is that it itself violates a lot of rules and it does not subscribe to many rules… China has a problem with that," said Prof Jia.

"China does not believe that one should compare Ukraine with Taiwan. Ukraine is a sovereign state, Taiwan is a province of China," he said. "Under existing international law... China has every right to make sure that Taiwan will not be split from China."

Ms Glaser argued that if Beijing supports the UN charter, then it has a responsibility to condemn the use of force in Ukraine, to have Chinese president Xi Jinping meet Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelensky, and to take on an active effort to end the war.

"It is unforgivable that China has never condemned Russia for its aggression against Ukraine," she said. "There is absolutely no reason that justifies Russia's invasion of Ukraine; its attempt to seize territory; its attempt basically to wipe Ukraine off the map and absorb it into Russia.

"So China's position is very contradictory - it supports territorial integrity of Ukraine, but it also, I think, is trying to preserve its relationship with Russia," Ms Glaser added. "And this is a difficult juggling act for China."

In response, Prof Jia said: "A lot of people are very critical of Russia. And a lot of people are not critical of Russia because they feel the threat of the US. And this is one of the major reasons for China to to be very moderate in terms of its position against Russia."

In seeking a solution to the war, one should not take an ideological position where there is no room for compromise, he reiterated.

"The real world is very complicated. The US has been supporting Israel for doing the same thing in the Middle East. So don't take a moralistic position on this, and try to think of a pragmatic solution on the basis of interests," said Prof Jia.

Asked earlier what lessons could be drawn from the war, he stressed that countries should respect and not be quick to dismiss one another's concerns.

"Never push a country, especially a big country, to a corner, however benign you think your intentions are," he said. "Unfortunately, so far, I think the lesson some countries have learned is just the opposite, as shown in the efforts to contain China."