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THE QIAN QICHEN OP-ED: OFFICIAL DISCONTENT OR JUST ONE MANS OPINION?
By Harvey Stockwin
Hu Jintao in Gabon earlier this year. China continues to place greater strategic importance on Africa.
China Brief: A Journal of Information and Analysis is a publication of The Jamestown Foundation, a private nonprot organization based in Washington, D.C. China Brief is a weekly journal of information and analysis covering Greater China in Eurasia. Since its founding in 1983, Jamestown has worked to increase public understanding of Communist and postCommunist societies. The opinions expressed in China Brief are solely those of the authors, and do not necessarily reect the views of the Jamestown Foundation.
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small airport. Despite Chinese assertions of control, tensions over the South China Seas waters have continued to rise. On October 26, a partnership of Malaysias Petronas Carigali Overseas, American Technology Inc. Petroleum, Singapore Petroleum Co. and Petrovietnams Petroleum Investment and Development Co. announced it had discovered oil at its offshore Yen Tu oileld, 43 miles off Haiphong, with a preliminary estimate of reserves at 181 million barrels. [2] The same day, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhang Qiyue immediately noted, China is seriously concerned and strongly dissatised. [3] China is also embroiled in a territorial dispute with Indonesia over the 272-island Natuna archipelago in the South China Sea, 150 miles northwest of Borneo. The islands have been in dispute for over a decade; in 1993, China presented a map of its historic claims on the Spratleys during a workshop in Surabaya, Indonesia, which included not only nearly the entire South China Sea but a portion of Indonesias Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) off the Natuna islands. [4] The Natunas natural gas reserves are among the largest in the world, estimated at 210 trillion cubic feet. [5] Chinas third maritime dispute is with Japan over the Senkaku (Diaoyu Tai) islands, which Japan currently administers. In a signicant partnering with its renegade province, China, together with Taiwan, have asserted their claims to the Senkakus, stating that they have been under Chinese sovereignty for the last 500 years. The ve small volcanic islands and three rocky outcroppings total only 2.7 square miles, but once again, the dispute is about the surrounding EEZ. None of the islands, which lie 105 miles northeast of Taiwan and 254 miles west of Okinawa, are inhabited. While Japan claims that it discovered the islands and incorporated them in 1895, China and Taiwan maintain that Chinese discovered the islets in 1372. The Director General of Japans Foreign Ministry Asian and Oceanian Affairs Bureau, Mitoji Yabunaka, and the head of the Agency for Natural Resources and Energy, Nobuyori Kodaira, met on October 26 with Chinas Foreign Ministry Asian Affairs Department Director General Cui Tiankai to discuss the disputed boundaries and natural gas reserves in the East China Sea. [6] At issue is each countrys claim to its EEZ under the Third United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), which came into force in November 1994. Under UNCLOS III, a country can claim an EEZ of 200 nautical miles from its coast, but the East China Sea is too narrow for such an arrangement to be feasible. China wants
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hammered out in the future. [9] Putins concessions angered many in Russias Far Eastern provinces, however. A senior ofcial in the Khabarovsk Territory speaking on condition of anonymity said, Over the years, we spent huge sums on reinforcing the border, deepening the river and populating the islands. It now transpires that Russia is sacricing part of its indigenous territory for the sake of transitory economic interest. [10] Finally, though oil does not inuence Chinas dispute over islands claimed by North Korea in the Yalu and Tumen, along with territory around Mount Paektu, the issue of stemming mass illegal migration of North Koreans escaping famine and oppression into northern China is likely to impel Beijing to modify its claims. For the moment, China has attempted diplomatic solutions to its territorial claims with its Southeast Asian neighbors: on November 2, 2002, it signed a Code of Conduct in the South China Sea with the Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN), committing all signatories to peaceful resolutions of outstanding issues. While predicting future Chinese actions is difcult, it would seem that China is willing to modify its historic claims in return for increased access to indigenous energy reserves. Energy security now seems to be the driving force behind much of Beijings foreign policy, much to the consternation of its energy-poor neighbors. In addition to the cases enumerated above, groups in Burma and Thailand have expressed concerns over Chinas construction of 13 hydroelectric dams on the Salween River in Yunnan province. The only certainty for Chinas East Asian neighbors is that as its economy continues to grow, so will Beijings need for energy. In the nal analysis, the best bargaining position for countries affected by the growing Chinese appetite for energy would be to develop an energy for land policy, the sooner the better. UPI international correspondent, Dr. John C. K. Daly received his Ph.D. in Russian and Middle Eastern Studies from the University of London and is an Adjunct Scholar at the Middle East Institute in Washington, DC. Notes 1. China Daily, Oct. 22, 2004. 2. Collective Bellacio, Oct. 27 2004. 3. Inter Press Service News Agency, Oct. 26, 2004. 4. Asian Affairs, Sept. 22, 1997 5. News and View Indonesia [ofcial publication] Sept. 1994 6. Kyodo News, 26 October 2004. 7. ANI news agency, Oct. 20, 2004. 8. Asia Times, 2 Nov. 2004.
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and ensuring access to energy and raw materials through diplomacy, investment, and trade. Diplomacy, Aid and Trade The Chinese government has invested heavily in Africa over the past four years to encourage trade relations, sponsoring the China-Africa Cooperation Forum to provide opportunities for governments and businesses to strengthen economic cooperation. The rst China-Africa Cooperation Forum took place in Beijing in 2000. It established a mechanism for promoting diplomatic relations, trade and investment between China and African countries. That same year, two-way trade between China and Africa surpassed US$10 billion for the rst time in history, reaching US$10.6 billion this number increased to US$18.545 billion in 2003. By 2004, 674 Chinese companies were operating in Africa. A forum held in Addis Ababa in December 2003, and attended by Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao, UN Secretary General Ko Annan, 250 businessmen from Africa and 150 from China, indicates the signicant support that Beijing provides African businesses with interests in China. The most recent forum was held in Beijing in October 2004. This cooperation between Chinese and African businesses is part of a long history of China providing aid to African countries, and thereby building goodwill and political support. Chinese assistance to African countries includes grants as well as low and no-interest loans. China is also very effective at leveraging loans a second time, forgiving debt for the poorest countries at the high-prole China-Africa Cooperation Forums. Chinas aid and debt forgiveness earns it signicant political capital among African countries, ensuring their support in the UN and other multilateral forums. Moreover, Chinese technical aid to Africa is becoming increasingly important in building Chinas inuence in the region. Medical, agricultural and engineering teams have provided technical aid to African countries for decades to support everything from building projects to treating AIDS patients. Since 1963, some 15,000 Chinese doctors have worked in 47 African states treating nearly 180 million cases of HIV/AIDS. At the end of 2003, 940 Chinese doctors were still working throughout the continent. Beijing prefers technical support over nancial aid to African countries for obvious reasons. Financial aid stretches resources and diverts capital from signicant needs at home, therefore investments in trade and projects that have a chance at providing returns are more popular than direct aid and loan programs.
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carefully consider its investments in countries that are likely to provide them with a stable return. Beijings Investment in Sudan Paying Off Chinas rapidly growing demand for imported oil and other raw materials surprised world commodity and nancial markets and revealed the extent to which China has invested in extractives industries in Africa in order to lock up barrels at their source. China, through the China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC), is the most visible and signicant investor in Sudanese oil exploration, transportation and production infrastructure. These investments enabled Sudan to begin exporting oil in 1999 and eventually become a net oil exporter. Though Sudans current production capacity of 310,000 barrels per day (bpd) is relatively insignicant compared to the global production of approximately 82 bpd, its product is of a high quality. Such so-called light-sweet crude is in short supply in global markets, and sells at a premium over Middle Eastern crude which has a higher sulfur content. Chinas investment in Sudanese oil production capacity has resulted in Sudans output now amounting to ve percent of Chinas total imports. Signicantly, China is Sudans single largest customer of oil, taking over half of Sudans exports in 2003. This relationship with Sudan provides Beijing with signicant diplomatic leverage over Khartoum, and puts China in a strong position to encourage Sudan to take measures to stop the violence in Darfur and even invest in social programs to promote domestic security and stability. Chinas experience in promoting trade and investment relations with Sudan illustrates its broader interests in Africa, as well as some of the competitive advantages Beijing enjoys when operating in difcult environments. African countries represent a signicant market for cheap Chinese-made products, which helps China maintain a favorable global balance of trade and creates jobs in China. Several African countries also present Chinese rms with an investment environment where they can compete effectively against Western multinational corporations that enjoy greater access to international capital and technology. Chinese companies have been very active investors in African infrastructure (including hydropower plants, pipelines, factories and hospitals) and are particularly competitive in countries where unreliable political situations, sanctions or other potential liabilities keep large multinationals from committing themselves. Chinese rms are not hindered at home by legal challenges from non-governmental organizations or concerned about corporate-image liabilities when investing in high-risk markets with unsavory regimes or where severe human rights abuses take place. In fact, Chinese companies
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Challenges to the Sino-Russian Relationship
By Matthew Oresman Now that the Sino-Russian diplomatic season celebrating 55 years of formal relations comes to a close, an opportunity exists to reassess the fundamentals of this dynamic and challenging relationship. After viewing Russian President Vladimir Putins summit with his Chinese counterpart Hu Jintao in Beijing last month, the visits of Premier Wen Jiabao and Vice-Premier Wu Yi to Moscow in September, and the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) Head of Government meeting, it is clear that despite 55 years of interaction, it is Russia and Chinas perceived national selfinterest that increasingly drives all aspects of their relations. And more and more, these national goals contradict one another, forcing the pair to make tough decisions. In the coming years, China and Russia will face serious dilemmas that will test the strength of their so-called strategic partnership and could expose underlying rifts between the two. By understanding China and Russias basic needs, we can more accurately predict how this relationship will evolve in the short-term and what choices and factors will most affect the ties between these two global powers. Chinas Needs China has three basic needs it looks to Russia to ll, at least in part: military arms, energy supplies, and sources of trade. A more complicated need for international political support and leverage also exists. Chinas demand for military equipment comes from its ongoing drive to reform its military into a ghting force that can repel any threat to the mainland and to develop capabilities to conquer Taiwan (including succeeding against the possibility of U.S. defense of the island). Domestic Chinese military production, while improving, is still signicantly behind American, Russian, and European standards. Beijing looks to Russia to help increase its military power. On energy, China has become a major importer of oil and gas. Chinas projected oil demand in 2015 will be 7.4 million bb/d (up from 3.4 million bb/ d is 2002), about half of which will need to be imported. Russia, with the potential to export up to 20-30 million tones a years from its elds in Siberia, provides an attractive source for Chinese imports, a source with which the United States will unlikely be able to interfere. Lastly, China is continuously looking for new investment opportunities and foreign markets to further fuel its rapid economic growth. Russia, with its still developing economy, untapped natural
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motivated fears of mass Chinese migration to Russias Far East have given way to a practical understanding that Russia needs Chinese labor. Recently, it was announced that Maritime Krays long-term development program envisions attracting as many as 500,000 Chinese workers by 2010 (up from 15,000 now). This is a dramatic change from the days of the yellow peril in the early 1990s. Additionally, Chinese-Russian bilateral volume trade is expected to reach $60 billion by 2008, up from $20 billion this year. Following the October Summit, China is planning to invest $12 billion in the Russian economy. However, President Putin has demanded this investment be in Russias emerging technology center and not in the natural resource sector, effectively crushing Chinas expressed interest in purchasing Yuganskneftegaz, the main production subsidiary of Yukos. Related to this, China and Russia have mutually recognized each others market economy status, and negotiations have been completed for Chinas approval of Russias WTO membership. Russias Needs Russias central need from China is money. While there is a similar demand for international political support and leverage, it is the Russian economys demand for continued investment that drives much of the relationship. This need is consistently met by Chinese military purchases and the export of oil. From 1990 to 2001, China bought over $10 billion worth of military equipment. This number has continued to grow in the last several years. Furthermore, Chinese energy purchases have made up a signicant portion of annual turnover. These two areas, arms and oil, make up the vast majority of Chinese-Russian trade, with the sale of normal market goods making up only a small fraction. Furthermore, Russia will gain in both its trade relationship with China and with the rest of the world when it eventually joins the WTO; a goal that is more likely now given Chinas recent support. While this support has cost Russia, especially in the area of a more lenient visa regime, Moscow is still in a very enviable position. In pure money versus material calculations, it seems that China needs Russia more than Russia needs China. While Russia needs Chinese investment to keep its arms industry alive, China has no alternative but to buy from the Russians (as long as Europe and the United States maintain their embargo). Without Russian arms, Chinas national security is in serious peril. Similarly, Chinese energy demand drives its thirst for Russian resources. However, in a global market, Russia has no problem nding buyers for its oil. China, though, does have a serious problem nding and securing sources of energy. This purely material calculation is overly
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engagement. This idea has gained support recently, as made evident by Russias rejection of Chinas proposal at the Heads of Government meeting to speed up region wide economic integration. According to RIA Novosti, an unnamed Russian ofcial stated that, We turned down the proposal in mild terms as it was clearly aimed at inltrating many of our markets. Furthermore, Russia has stepped up its own bilateral and multilateral cooperation with Central Asian states: beeng up its forces in Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan and becoming a full member of the Central Asian Cooperation Organization. All this paints a picture of Russia becoming increasingly worried about China in Central Asia and not interested in offering the kind of support China would like. However, this dynamic is still evolving and it is unclear how Moscow will react to Chinas ongoing encroachment into Russias back yard. What is clear, though, is that China and Russias mutual political support is increasingly guided by one or the others relationship with the United States, and, to a lesser degree, Europe. Nixons brilliant calculation that Russia and China fundamentally face away from each other still holds true today. Russia sees its future in the development of ties to Europe and the West, while China focuses intensely on its place in Asia. In pragmatic terms, when China realizes it can gain more from America by abandoning a common position it holds with Russia, it will do so. And Russia will do the same concerning a Chinese potion. Conversely, when the two realize that they will achieve the most through a joint position, they will stand against the United States. This was evident last year when Russia attempted to stand in the way of Americas invasion of Iraq, until the United States promised to honor Russias existing oil contracts. China, on the other hand, remained quiet, and seems to have won American approval to retain control over its small Iraqi elds. On the other hand, Russia and China have united in a common bargaining position regarding North Korea as a way to push the United States to a negotiated settlement of the conict. The open question, though, is will China and Russia be there for each other when it counts? Moscow and Beijing would like to think so, but if the dispute involves the United States, it is doubtful that either will support the other over their own national interest. This question increasingly plagues the Sino-Russian relationship and challenges the supposed strong foundation on which it is based. Only time will tell if this marriage of convenience can make it to a diamond anniversary. Matthew Oresman is the Director of the China-Eurasia Forum (CEF) and Editor of the CEF Quarterly. Information about the CEF can be found at www.chinaeurasia.org. ***
The Qian Qichen Op-ed: Ofcial Discontent or Just one Mans Opinion?
By Harvey Stockwin In one of his farewell interviews with the televised Wall Street Journal Report, retiring Secretary of State Colin Powell once again made the claim that Sino-American relations are now in their best state in three decades. The Report ironically illustrated the interview with shots of Powell conferring with former Chinese Foreign Minister Qian Qichen, apparently unaware that Qian had just done his best to demolish Powells claim in two publications owned by the Chinese Communist Party. On November 1st, the op-ed page of the China Daily carried a major article entitled U.S. Strategy to Be Blamed, placed under a cartoon of a Republican Elephant and a Democratic Donkey struggling towards a distant White House. As the title implied, the article was a highly critical assessment of the United States role in international affairs. Had it been written by a Chinese academic, it would have attracted attention only by virtue of its timing, coming right on the eve of polling in the U.S. but the bye-line attached to the article was that of Qian Qichen, one of the Chinese Communist Partys (CCP) recognized experts on international relations. The episode was the more puzzling because it arose just as Chinese academic commentators on Sino-Americans relations were welcoming the fact that there had been no China-bashing during this current U.S. presidential election. China has never been a positive factor in American politics, wrote Professor Fan Gang of Beijing University, from Chinas perspective the less it is mentioned in this election season, the better. Professor Fan suggested that the lack of China-bashing by Kerry and Bush may indicate that Americas political elite is facing up to the new realities, and adjusting its view of China accordingly. So it is strange that Beijing itself reminded the U.S. political elite of old and enduring communist realities by launching a strong verbal attack on the Bush Administration. The article was a forthright rendition of the calculations and ambitions, fears and tensions, which customarily underlie the CCPs view of the world, and with which any regular reader of Chinese propaganda is familiar. Besides its timing, the article attracted additional attention by virtue of its stridently anti-American tone and its well-placed author. As
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Foreign Minister in the post-1989 period, Qian maneuvered skillfully to try and win back Chinas international prestige in the aftermath of the 1989 Beijing Massacre. Later, as Vice Premier, Qian continued to direct foreign relations after he ceased to be Foreign Minister. While he has retired from ofce, along with the rest of the third generation of CCP leaders, it is certain that he remains highly inuential in foreign affairs, and is therefore capable of delivering an election-eve attack on the Bush Administration in the English-language newspaper owned and published by the CCP. Reecting traditional Chinese fears of encirclement, Qian suggested that, under the Bush Doctrine the U.S. has tightened its control of the Middle East, Central Asia, Southeast Asia, and Northeast Asia, and that Washingtons anti-terror campaign has already gone beyond the scope of self-defense. On the Bush Administrations motivation, Qian was blunt: The U.S. has not changed its Cold War mentalityThe philosophy of the Bush Doctrine is, in essence, force. It advocates the United States should rule over the whole world with overwhelming force, military force in particular. Nor was Qian sparing in his criticism of the Iraq War: the United States did win a war in the military dimension but it is far from winning the peace Washington has opened a Pandoras Box, intensifying various intermingled conicts such as ethnic and religious onesThe Iraq War has made the U.S. even more unpopular in the international community than its war in Vietnam The Iraq War was an optional war, not a necessary one He suggested the Iraq War should help end the trans-Atlantic alliance since the rift between the U.S. and its traditional European allies has never been so wide. It is now time to give up the illusion that Europeans and Americans are living in the same world, as some Europeans would like to believe. Moreover, Qian takes a distinctly negative view of the socalled war on terror: The pre-emptive strategy will bring the Bush Administration an outcome that it is most unwilling to see, that is, absolute insecurity of the American Empire and its demise because of expansion it cannot cope with The Iraq War has destroyed the hard-won global anti-terror coalitionMounting hostile sentiments among the Muslim world towards the United States, following the war, have already helped the al-Qaeda terrorist network recruit more followers and suicide martyrs. Instead of dropping, the number of terrorist activities throughout the world is now on the increase. Qians view of the U.S. is equally bleak: The current U.S. predicament in Iraq serves as another example that when a countrys superiority psychology inates beyond its real
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curry favor with the next U.S. Administration in which case it has backred. Or was there a more devious political motivation at work? Was the article an extremely devious Chinese effort to see that Bush was re-elected? Another possibility is that deliberately defective diplomacy may have been attempted, possibly by a high-ranking Jiang Zemin protg, with the specic aim of embarrassing the Hu Jintao administration. Alternatively, it was conceivably an attempt by a Hu Jintao ally to discredit Jiang Zemin. But unquestionably Qian was either expressing a CCP majority view which he himself nurtures, or at least the opinions of an inuential minority. While Chinese ofcials dismissed the article as the work of a retired ofcial, the signicance of Qians comments was underlined by the speedy disappearance of the article from the Internet archives of the China Daily and Peoples Daily. We may never know who ordered Qians trenchant words to be published. As it undertook hasty damage-control, Beijing must have been hoping that the Bush Administration would fail to notice what the article strongly suggests a growing alienation in Sino-American relations. Interviewed by the Financial Times on November 8th, Colin Powell said he accepted Chinese protestations that Qian Qichens remarks did not reect ofcial policy. This, however, hardly resolves the matter. Harvey Stockwin has been reporting Asian politics and international relations since 1955 and has been Chinawatching from his base in Hong Kong since 1978.
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