Have Sino-Pak relations reached the end of the road?

By Abid Mustafa

On his visit to Pakistan, the Chinese President Hu Jintao emphasised the
importance of Sino-Pak relations and expressed his desire to expand
bilateral ties between the two countries. “Let us build on past achievement
and strengthen traditional friendship, advanced with the time, expand and
enrich China-Pakistan strategic partnership so that our friendship will pass
on from generation to generation,” he said. The Pakistani government
reciprocated by praising China’s relationship with Pakistan. Colourful
metaphors like “time-tested friendship” and “all weather friendship” were
employed to convey this message to the Pakistani public. Supporters of the
government pointed to the 18 agreements signed between the two countries as
proof of China’s longstanding commitment to Pakistan. These agreements
included the much publicised Free Trade Agreement (FTA), the establishment
of a free zone in Lahore for Chinese businesses, and a five year plan to
boost bilateral trade between the two countries to $15 billion by 2011.

But beyond the media grabbing headlines and the over-inflated speeches by
politicians—Pakistan’s relationship with China has reached a crescendo and
is unlikely to progress any further. In contrast, China’s relationship with
India has vastly improved and the two adversaries are exploring numerous
partnerships to augment their newfound relationship. Prior to visiting
Pakistan, Hu spent a few days in India and signed 13 agreements. These
included protection of bilateral investment, trade of iron ore and the
export of rice, agriculture cooperation, educational assistance, and the
conservation of cultural heritage. Nevertheless the most obvious improvement
in relations has been in bilateral trade. From a meagre US$117 million in
the late eighties, the two-way trade for this year stands at $20 billion and
is projected to reach $50 billion for 2010.

On the energy front the two nations instead of competing with each other are
cooperating to meet the energy demands of their burgeoning economies. 
Indian and Chinese companies can be found collaborating on oil and gas
projects in Iran, Syria, Sudan, Kazakhstan, South America and elsewhere in
the world. While some of these joint ventures maybe small the trend supports
the notion that China prefers to engage India over the acquisition and
protection of energy resources. Commenting on the need of both countries to
play an active role in shaping the international energy order, Prime
Minister Manmohan Singh and President Hu said in a joint statement: “There
is the need for an international energy order, and for global energy systems
to take into account the needs of both countries based on a stable,
predictable, secure and clean energy future. In this context, the
international civilian nuclear cooperation should be advanced through
innovative and forward-looking approaches while safeguarding the
effectiveness of international non-proliferation principles.”

On the nuclear front China has offered assistance to bolster India’s nuclear
energy for civilian purposes. The nuclear cooperation on offer is on more or
less equivalent to what China has in place with Pakistan. Furthermore, Hu’s
refusal to commit to the building of extra nuclear reactors on his trip to
Pakistan underscores China’s intention of alluring India into a long-term
nuclear partnership. On this note an interesting statement was issued by US
State Department spokesman Sean McCormack in response to an Indian reporter
who questioned whether China’s nuclear help to Pakistan extended to civilian
nuclear reactors. McCormack said there was no new nuclear agreement between
Pakistan and China “other than what was already grandfathered in by the
Nuclear Suppliers Group.”

Drawing confidence from the emerging nuclear cooperation between the two
countries, the Indians believe that China will not scupper India’s bid to
join the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG). Speaking on the matter External
Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee said, “I am confident.”  Little wonder
then that Manmohan Singh gave an upbeat assessment of Sino-Indian relations.
He said,” At the fulcrum of our efforts is our collective political will to
enrich and reinforce our strategic and cooperative partnership for peace and
prosperity, and to resolve our outstanding issues in a focused, sincere and
problem-solving manner.”

China and India have also made strides on defence matters. This includes
port calls, joint search-and-rescue exercises and defence exchanges. Last
year this relationship was upgraded when Beijing and New Delhi signed a
memorandum of understanding on defence cooperation.  While the military ties
between the two countries are still in their infancy and do not quite match
the military relationship found between China and Pakistan—it is more than
evident that China is taking a different view of its one time adversary.
Leaving boundary disputes aside, both countries are enjoying the benefits a
multi-faceted bilateral relationship.

There are several reasons as to why Indian-Sino relations are expanding and
maturing in comparison to Sino-Pak relations, which bear all the hallmarks
of an association that is slowly becoming nominal.

Pakistan and September 11

In the aftermath of September 11, Pakistan adopted a more aggressive policy
towards China. This policy disguised as the fight against terrorism enabled
America to dislodge Taliban from power, appoint a puppet regime in Kabul and
set up several military bases in Afghanistan. Moreover, Pakistan opened up
it airspace to American fighter planes and under the pretext of search and
rescue missions allowed the presence of a number of American air bases on
Pakistani soil. Some of these air bases hosted several hundred American
military personnel.

For the first time in many years, China perceived Pakistan to play an active
role in cementing American hegemony adjacent to Chinese western
borders—China now felt ensnared by America’s military might stretching from
the Asian Pacific rim to Afghanistan. Pakistan attempted to dispel these
concerns by inviting China to invest in Gwadar the deep water port project
in 2002. Pakistan promised China that Gwadar would facilitate the transport
Chinese goods to Central Asia and give China access to the Arabian Sea and
Middle Eastern markets. However, beyond the development of the port, China
has shown little enthusiasm to utilise Gwadar as a gateway to these markets.
The lack of interest is due to America’s military presence in the region
coupled with insurgencies in Balochistan and the tribal areas. China is also
well aware of America’s long-term plan to separate the Balochistan province
from Pakistan and fuse it with Iran’s Balochistan region creating Balochi
state. Aspects of this plan have been mentioned in various US intelligence
papers such as CIA paper on Global Trends in 2015.

China’s has reacted to these developments by strengthening Shanghai
Cooperation Organisation (SCO) and together with Russia is keeping the door
firmly shut to any American intrusion into Central Asia from Afghanistan.

Normalisation between India and Pakistan

During the cold war China understood India’s closeness to the Soviet Union
as a threat to its security. To mitigate this danger, China extended its
support to Pakistan— a defacto balance of power equation was pursued by
China in South Asia. However with the ascendancy of the pro-American BJP to
power in India in the late nineties, and the ensuing normalistion process
between India and Pakistan, China had to readjust its policy. China was now
facing a combined threat from two pro-American countries. September 11 gave
a fresh impetus to the normalisation process and magnified the threat posed
by Pakistan and India to Chinese security. Beijing’s hitherto policy of
balance of power slowly gave way to a policy of ‘engage and contain’ India
and Pakistan—both countries under American auspices were being groomed to
act as a counterweight against China.

This meant that China had to carefully recalibrate its relationship with
Pakistan, so as not to undermine its traditional sensitivities with
Islamabad and yet, at the same time make overtures to India to gain her
trust. India being much bigger than Pakistan required China to invest more
time, effort and money not only to engage India, but also to contain it. The
example of the latter is the signing of the FTA with Pakistan. The removal
of Pakistani tariffs on 2,423 products to zero percent will encourage China
to buttress her economic position in the Pakistani domestic market, making
it difficult for Indian companies to do likewise when a free-trade agreement
is reached between Islamabad and New Delhi. China has conducted a similar
agreement with Bangladesh in the hope of constricting Indian companies.

Indian government split over US relations

Another reason that has persuaded China to enhance its engagement with India
is the Congress Party and her allies supplanting BJP as the governing
coalition. Distrust of America runs deep in both Congress and her partners.
China senses these sentiments and has exploited them to her advantage. For
example many of the oil and gas ventures between the two countries
flourished under the anti-American Petroleum Minister Mani Shankar Aiyar who
was eventually replaced by Manmohan Singh due to US pressure. Still the
schisms persist and even the pro-American Manmohan Singh cannot ignore them.

Whereas, China’s rapprochement with India is cognisant of anti-American
nuance within American-Indian relations, no such differences pervade Pak-US
relations. By all accounts Pakistan is a subordinate state to America, and
this not only complicates Pakistan’s relationship with China, but hinders
Beijing from enhancing its ties with Islamabad.

Resurgence of Islam

The resurgence of political Islam across the Muslim world has forced China
to explore relations with non-Islamic countries. Since September 11, China
has sought to expand security cooperation with Russia, Israel and India as a
means of countering political Islam, in particular the re-emergence of the
Caliphate.  A few years ago Russia and China invited India to discuss this
very prospect.

All of these factors have contributed to China’s expansion of ties with
India. But the eventual outcome of US-China-India-Pakistan relations hinges
on three issues: America’s ability to extricate itself from Afghanistan and
Iraq; Pakistan ability to wrest control of its domestic and foreign policy
from America; China’s ability to assert itself as a global power.

If the present trends continue then Sino-Pakistan relations will quickly
degenerate and Pakistan will be bereft of its only friend in the
international arena China.

December 2 2006

Abid Mustafa is a political commentator who specialises in Muslim affairs