I was in Qingdao for a wedding last week. The Chinese coastal city is best-known for its Tsingtao Brewery built by the Germans in 1903. And Tsingtao beer is now China’s main exported beer. In the 1980s, the Tsingtao beer company attempted to acquire a local rival. It was a long fight, and I was told that locals jokingly referred to it as the city’s mini-version of the eight-year Iran-Iraq war. Why? The Chinese media referred to the war as the “Yi-Yi” war, because the Chinese-words for Iran and Iraq both start with the character “Yi”.
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Tag Archives: Iran
Qingdao’s mini Iran-Iraq war
China’s Iran Headache
China’s foreign policy is at an inflexion point. The country is emerging as a major power, but that will require tough choices.
The toughest choices are usually found in the Middle East. The region doesn’t like major powers sitting on the fence, and it’s only time before China will be forced to climb down.
It is Iran that will likely force a decision. China has so far maintained its policy of non-intervention─as one Beijing-based policy advisor said to me, “if we intervene in Iran, it would set a bad precedent for our relations with other countries”.
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Iran, China and a NYT editorial
Here’s an interesting New York Times editorial by Flynt Leverett and Hillary Mann Leverett. I had dinner with Hillary in Washington earlier this month, and the topic of China’s relations with Iran was raised. I agree with the editorial that an Obama administration proposal for Saudi Arabia to replace China’s oil imports from Iran is unworkable. The proposal assumes that the Chinese would be more willing to impose sanctions on Iran if they didn’t have to worry about the fact that Iran accounts for more than 10% of the country’s oil imports. I met with a senior Chinese policy advisor on Iran during a trip to Beijing last week.
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China, Iran, and Syria go head-to-head
Two foreign parties have designs on a Middle East country. One of the parties is Iranian and is already well entrenched in the country.
Sound familiar?
Maybe. But this story has a twist. China’s Geely and Iran’s Khodro are car companies. They both produce low-cost cars, and they both have ambitions to capture a share of the Syrian car market and use the country as an export base.
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A quick lesson in China’s relations with Iran
This is an interesting quote from Wang Zhen, an academic at the Shanghai Academy of Social Science’s East Europe, Middle & West Asia Institute, in relation to Iran. It neatly captures a key influence, or restraint, on China’s policy stance towards the Middle East. I’ve heard the same from other academics. “China also needs Iran to prevent the spread of extremist thinking and acts,” Wang says. “Iran has a large influence in the Islamic world, and China needs Iran to keep communication channels with the Islamic community in China too. China has millions of Muslims here”.
The Flipside of Sanctions
Iran faces its greatest challenge since the revolution in 1979. It is unclear how events will play out. However, the chances of Ahmadinejad remaining in power are still high. And, as President Obama recently said, Mousavi may be no easier to deal with. The upshot is that the West is likely to leave sanctions in place.
Yet, there is good reason to doubt the effectiveness of sanctions. So far, sanctions have targeted Iran’s economy. The assumption is that Iran’s leadership will give way to foreign demands as the economy grinds to a halt. But while the economy is straining, it certainly isn’t buckling.
Why not? In part because Asia has stepped in to fill the gap. Asia’s exports to Iran have soared from $2 billion to $17 billion over the past decade. The region exports cars and clothes to Iran and imports oil and gas in return. Its share of Iran’s total trade has nearly doubled to 25 percent, grabbing market share from Europe.
Silk Road Gallery
Canton Trade Fair
August 12th, 2010
August 12th, 2010
“China cheat sheet helps investors survive”, Bloomberg, September 1, 2010
“No more silver bullets for Beijing”, Wall Street Journal, June 17, 2010
“China’s historic return to the Gulf”, Foreign Policy, April 2, 2010
