Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said on Jan. 24 that his country was resolved to produce its own highly enriched uranium — a long-standing bone of contention between Tehran and the West. The West offered Iran a draft nuclear deal last November under a resolution of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) that called for Tehran to trade about 80 percent of its domestically produced low-grade uranium for highly enriched nuclear fuel from France and Russia.
The uranium would then be converted into fuel rods and returned to Iran for use in the medical research. Such an arrangement was designed to reduce Iran’s ability to make a nuclear weapon quickly and buy more time for negotiations. Iran has rejected the offer.
The five permanent members of the UN Security Council and Germany, known as the P5+1, met in New York on Jan. 16 to deliberate the way ahead on Iran’s nuclear issue. Spokesman Robert Cooper said the group was concerned that “Iran has been secretly building the enrichment facility near Qom, with no credible civilian purpose, without notifying the IAEA with due time in accordance with its safeguard obligation, and in violation of [the] Security Council resolution.”
The group was also concerned by Iran’s “insufficient cooperation” with the IAEA and failure to comply with the agency’s resolution demanding it stop enriching uranium and urged Iran to halt construction of the Qom facility, Cooper said.
The US, France and Britain are eager to impose more targeted measures, including Iran’s financial and insurance sectors, as well as its powerful Revolutionary Guards, which control the country’s nuclear program. Iran remains defiant.
Iran has withstood three rounds of limited UN sanctions so far. While China voted for these sanctions, Beijing’s calculations are complex and intriguing. By agreeing to limited sanctions, China wanted to show the US and the international community that it is a “responsible stakeholder” on the issue of nuclear non-proliferation, while hoping to reduce the threat of a US or joint US-Israel armed attack against Iran.
Iran can continue to count on China (and Russia) to delay, obstruct and water down any harsher measures sought by the US and the EU. If past experience serves as a guide, the fourth round of UN sanctions against Iran will be an ordeal, consuming months of negotiations and haggling with, the end result being another toothless resolution.
Beijing has already expressed its objection to new sanctions on Iran. Chinese Ambassador to the UN Zhang Yesui (張業遂) said on Jan. 5 that imposing tougher sanctions on Iran over its nuclear program is a poor idea while diplomatic negotiations remain possible. He told a news conference to observe China’s assumption of the presidency of the Security Council last month that “sanctions themselves are not an end” and negotiations with Iran need “some more time and patience.”
Catherine Ashton, the EU’s chief diplomat, was quoted by Voice of America as complaining that six years of dialogue with Iran by her predecessor, Javier Solana, “had yielded little.”
The fact that Beijing sent only a low-ranking diplomat to the P5+1 meeting on Iran was indicative of its attitude on more penalties for Iran. This should not be surprising. China considers Iran an ally and a valuable strategic partner, and they have worked closely to challenge and counterbalance perceived US hegemony in the Middle East. In fact, last December, China’s army delivered armored vehicles to Iran to help the mullahs’ fight against pro-democracy protesters. In so doing, China officially joined in to repress the Iranian people in order to prevent the downfall of the Islamic regime and protect its own interests in the region.
Since the 1990s, China’s new policy priorities in the Middle East have included the development and consolidation of energy resources. China is Iran’s top oil market, while Iran is China’s third-largest supplier, behind only Angola and Saudi Arabia. The Chinese buy about 15 percent of their oil from Iran. State-run companies like Sinopec Group have signed contracts valued at billions of dollars to help Iran develop oil gas fields.
In addition to energy, China is extensively involved in many areas of Iran’s economic development. To help develop Iran’s economy, empower it, and open up consumer markets for Chinese-made goods as well as investment opportunities are also China’s major policy priorities. More than 100 Chinese state companies are working in Iran to help build infrastructure projects — highways, ports, shipyards, airports, dams, steel complexes and more.
Two-way China-Iran trade exceeds US$13 billion, making China Iran’s No. 2 trading partner, behind only the United Arab Emirates. It goes without saying that China does not observe UN sanctions.
Occasionally, the US blows the whistle on China’s violations and imposes sanctions on Chinese companies for selling Iran weapons, weapons-related products and other dual-use commodities.
A recent US press report said former Manhattan district attorney Robert Morgenthau had uncovered illicit Iranian finance and procurement network providing unmistakable evidence that Tehran was attempting to produce weapons of mass destruction, and his office was prosecuting a Chinese company for attempting to thwart financial sanctions against Iran. The Senate Foreign Relations Committee has corroborated Morgenthau’s findings.
Former US president George W. Bush once considered China a strategic rival to the US, but changed his attitude and sought Beijing’s cooperation on the war against terror after the Sept. 11 attacks. US President Barack Obama views the US-China relations the most important bilateral relationship in the globe and has sought Beijing’s assistance to cope with the nuclear problems in Iran and North Korea, the war in Afghanistan, climate change and international economic woes, among others.
Thus far, China’s responses to these issues, and its external behavior in general, can hardly be described as that of a responsible international stakeholder worthy of the status of a permanent member of the UN Security Council. China has its own strategic interests and international agenda, quite different from those of the US. Is China a genuine friend of the US, then? For the US to prevent further peril, Obama should recognize that China is not a friend.
Parris Chang is a professor emeritus of political science at Pennsylvania State University and former deputy secretary-general of the National Security Council.
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