Dr. Naser Al-Tamimi
Al-Arabiya - April 28, 2013
Many observers have noted recently that China’s foreign policy has
turned more assertive than it has been in decades. When it comes to the
Middle East, it has expressed this aggressiveness mostly through the
veto power it wields in the United Nations Security Council, protecting
Iran from crippling sanctions over its nuclear program. Additionally,
the Chinese government, along with the Russians, have prevented the UN
from sanctioning the Syrian regime.
There are different interpretations of Chinese assertiveness; Charles
Grant from the Center for European Reform, recently provided a number of
factors to explain the situation: China’s economic growth has surged at
a time when the West is in crisis, making China’s leaders more
self-confident and less willing to accept Western tutelage. At the same
time problems in Tibet and Xinjiang, and perhaps events in the Arab
world, have made them feel insecure; the growth of nationalist postings
on the Internet has started to influence policy; and the leadership
transition makes China’s leaders unwilling to be seen as soft on
foreigners. While, Yao Yang, the director of the China Center for
Economic Research at Peking University and editor of China Economic
Quarterly, wrote in the Financial Times: “After the 2008-09 financial
crisis, the US suddenly found that it had to face a more confident
China. To them, [the US and EU] China will only be treated as ‘one of
us’ after China is fully transformed politically and socially. This
discrepancy of beliefs will be a major source of tension between China
and existing powers in the coming years.”
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