China’s Dream and the Middle East

REUTERS/ROMEO RANOCO

China\'s President Xi Jinping waves upon arrival at the international airport in Manila November 17, 2015, to attend the upcoming Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Economic Leaders Meeting.

November 2012, two weeks after being elected secretary-general of the Central Committee of China’s Communist Party, Xi Jinping visited The Road Towards Renewal, an exhibition at the Chinese National Museum in Beijing. There, Xi Jinping delivered a speech.

"I am fully convinced that the big dream on the reform of the Chinese nation will become a reality," he said.

It has never been explained in detail what China’s "big dream" is. But, in a broad outline, the Chinese Dream is related to the political goal of "building a prosperous society in 2021 when China’s Communist Party celebrates its 100^th anniversary” and changing China into a “modern state” when the People\'s Republic of China marks its 100^th anniversary in 2049 (Bruno Maçães: 2018).

On every occasion, Xi Jinping emphasizes the Chinese Dream. Indeed, a nation must have a dream, even a big dream to become a great nation. With regard to how to realize the dream, every nation and state has its own way.

China is now convinced of its ability to realize its dream, to close the dark history in its past. What China cannot forget is "the century of humiliation" when the country was forced to recognize Western power and domination after being militarily defeated in the Opium War in the middle of the 19^th century Qing Dynasty (1644-1911/1912).

At a national security seminar on Feb. 17, 2017, Chinese President Xi Jinping for the first time said that China had to lead in shaping, determining the "new world order" and safeguarding the international security.

"The overall trend of the world multipolarity, economic globalization and democratization of international relations remains unchanged. We should control the international community to jointly build a new world order that is more just, fair-minded and reasonable."

In other parts, as reported by the Xinhua news agency, Xi Jinping said, "We should guide the international community to jointly maintain international security."

When Xi Jinping delivered his speech, the annual Munich Security Conference and the meeting of G-20 finance ministers were taking place. Xi Jinping\'s speech seemed to emphasize that the Western-dominated world order was approaching the end point because Western countries had little interest or the capability to interfere in global problems. He may be referring to United States President Donald Trump, who has chosen to pursue an isolationist foreign policy.

Middle East

Kompas Daily (22/7/2018) reported that China is strengthening its cooperation in the Middle East and Africa. Actually, China\'s ties with the Middle East were forged in the 1980s and further strengthened in the 1990s. China\'s presence and interest in the Middle East in the 1980s was partly to compete with the US and the Soviet Union, while others were to gain greater international recognition against its rival Republic of China (ROC) in Taiwan.

The policy bore results. In 1984, the United Arab Emirates normalized its relations with China, followed by Qatar in 1988, Bahrain in 1989, Saudi Arabia in 1990 and Israel in 1991.

China\'s interest in the Middle East, especially in the economic sector, increased in the 1990s and continue to increase in the 2000s, up to the present. China\'s main interest in the Middle East is for energy security, geostrategic ambition, links between external and internal stability and improving the great power status (Andrew Scobell and Alireza Nader: 2016). Of course, besides that, it is also to balance the US presence in the Middle East.

According to a Chinese analyst, "The Middle East will continue to be China\'s biggest source of oil imports and this is the Middle East\'s strategic value for China." (Niu Xinchun: 2014). On the contrary, China has also become a source for development in Middle Eastern countries.

In the Arab-China Cooperation Forum (CASCF) on July 10 in Beijing, China announced that it would provide loans to several Arab countries worth US$20 billion and provide additional packages of assistance worth $100 million to Palestine, Yemen, Lebanon, Jordan and Syria (The Diplomat, 2018).

These loans and assistance are an important part of China\'s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) to connect more than 60 countries in Asia, the Middle East, Africa and Europe in a multifaceted trade, transportation and partnership network to strengthen social and economic development for everyone.

Therefore, the presence of China in the Middle East is a counterbalance, or at least maintaining balance for the hostile relations between Saudi Arabia and Iran. Therefore, all of the countries, which are under the "shade" and "shadow" of both Saudi Arabia and Iran, are in the embrace of China.

Meanwhile China\'s presence, with its economic strength, will also be a balance for the presence of the US and also Russia in the Middle East, even though there are those who state that these countries are included in China\'s debt trap diplomacy.

Kompas/Handining

Trias Kuncahyono

Will China\'s move contribute to the creation of peace in the Middle East? Time will tell.

However, the move to the Middle East is part of an effort to realize the Chinese Dream because in the Middle East there was a meeting between Europe and Asia, which Bruno Maçães called an area that would mark the arrival of the Eurasian dawn, the loss of Western domination.

Trias Kuncahyono, Observer on the Middle East at the Middle East Institute