Welcome to Hard Talk on the BBC World Service with me, Zaynab Bedawi.

Increasing tensions between the United States and China have plunged relations to the lowest level for decades.

And this comes at a time when the world is facing its worst recession in living memory because of coronavirus.

Could this lead to a reshaping of the global order and if so, who will come out on top?

My guest is one of the most prominent thinkers in Asia, Singapore's Kishore Mahbubani. A former diplomat,

he believes COVID-19 has weakened the West and made China bolder. Is he right that this is now Asia's century?

Kishu Mahabani in Singapore, welcome to hard talk. Why do you believe that COVID-19 will mark a shift

in power to Asia? COVID-19 is only going to accelerate the shift of power to Asia, which is already

happening beforehand.

And as I always say, from the year 1 to the year 1800, for 1800 of the last 2,000 years,

China and India were always the two largest economies. They're coming back.

But clearly, COVID-19 is accelerating it.

Because what is a big shock to the world is that the most competent countries in dealing

with COVID-19 are the East Asian countries. And just look at one statistic, the number of deaths

per million in East Asian countries all the way, South Korea, Japan, China, Vietnam, Singapore,

everywhere is less than 10. In Europe, it's in the hundreds. In the United States,

in the hundreds. Why exactly this is happening? I don't know. It's an indicator that when it comes

to competence in governance, it is shifting to Asia. That's a pretty sweeping statement. Are you not reading too much into this?

It could be that Asian countries have had to deal with avian flu and SARS in the past 20 years,

which has perhaps improved their responses. Senegal in Africa did well because of its response

to Ebola six years ago. It learned important lessons.

So that may just simply be a reflection of the fact that they are better prepared.

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