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'An Analysis of China’s Role in the Security and Development of Afghanistan'

China as a second economic country in the world has the nearest border with Afghanistan in the neighbouring countries. Since China’s economy is rapidly growing and its population becomes 1.5 billion, this country tries to influence in the neighbouring countries which have natural resources. Afghanistan is a country which has about 100 kilometres border with China. Due to the fact, China became more interested in Afghanistan because of having natural resources. According to the article in the Margalla journal in 2012 “The Role of China in Economic Stabilization and Reconstruction of Afghanistan”, author Sayed Waqas Haider Bukhari stated that Afghanistan has natural resources and the nearest border in Asia, China as a most populous and rapidly industrial country of the world has shown its economic, politic and security-based interests in Afghanistan. Thus, this essay will summarize the main points of the author regarding the economic and politic relationship between China and Afghanistan, and moreover, it will review and evaluate the arguments of the author. By doing so, this essay will look that why does China want to have the role of a mediator in peace talks in Afghanistan. China has started its economic relationship with Afghanistan from the very early age of 1955 while they exchanged their ambassadors. China and Afghanistan had a good relationship until 1996, but this relationship had frozen during the Taliban period. Then after the incident of 9/11 China began its frozen relationship with Afghanistan. In 2002, China and Afghanistan signed the “Kabul Delectation on Good Neighborly Relations”. In this agreement, both countries promised to respect their territorial sovereignty peace process and assistance on construction. In 2008, China and Afghanistan signed another contract by the name of “treaty of bilateral friendship cooperation” which allowed China’s inverters in Afghanistan. Moreover, China aided Afghanistan more than 205 million dollars from 2002-2010. Despite the economic aids, China and Afghanistan have started working on different fields like agriculture, infrastructure, building, hydroelectricity and natural resources. However, Afghanistan as China’s neighbouring country has many unexplored natural resources. This country by having copper, coal, iron, gas, cobalt, mercury, gold and thorium estimated more than one trillion dollars. This all natural resources made China become more interested in Afghanistan and has signed many projects like Aynak copper, and Amue Daya oil. China has a good economic relationship in Afghanistan. After post 9/11 of China played a constructive role in the development and reconstruction of Afghanistan. After 2002 when the Taliban removed, China has supported Afghanistan in the international community to overcome the problems. Since Afghanistan is an underdeveloped country with extreme poverty, unemployment, and poor infrastructure, China promised about 150 million dollar aid to Afghanistan in 2002. China has supported different reconstruction project in Afghanistan. For example, China has aid more 10 million dollars for Parwan Irrigation Projects and a hospital in Kabul. Moreover, China has given human resource training to 800 different officials and technical training to local Afghans in Afghanistan. Despite all the aids and cooperation in Afghanistan, China also has its own interests behind this supports. Its interests in Afghanistan are their projects. For instance, Anyak Copper is one of the main prominent project of China in Afghanistan which is signed by a Chines company by the name of China Metallurgical cooperation. Meanwhile, this project is a big investment in the history of Afghanistan. On one hand, this project will reserve more than 88 billion dollars to Afghanistan. On the other hand, this project will generate more than 11 million tons of copper for 25 years for China. Therefore, the completion of this project takes time and security in Afghanistan. Besides the economic relationship with Afghanistan, China is also concerning about the security of Afghanistan as the nearest neighbouring country. Because the Insecurity and instability of Afghanistan will effect on China’s security, especially the Xinjiang province. On the one hand, China doesn’t have any ethnic community in Afghanistan to interfere in the internal political affairs of Afghanistan. But China is afraid of its own ethnic group called Uighur who are living in the Xingjian province of China. These Uighurs have the same culture and faith as the Afghan Taliban, and China is thinking that these groups will come to Afghanistan for training and fight against China’s government. On the other hand, the instability and insecurity in Afghanistan will cause that the Uighurs will be independent in Xingjian. Due to the fact, in 2014, the president of the two countries in a joint conference promised in intelligence sharing against terrorist groups. As the author maintains, due to the fact that China is not likely to let Afghanistan be under the control of the Taliban because it will control the East Turkestan Islamic Movement led by Uighurs. What is to be noted here is that the author makes a linkage between China’s security concern and its interest in economic investment. The author says, as it is mentioned earlier, that China has many projects in Afghanistan, and that for this economic interest China needs security and stability in Afghanistan to complete its already invested projects. The author also identifies China’s soft policy toward Afghanistan different from the West. He said that the soft image of the policy of China is, on the one hand, disturbing the western powers because they are unable to control the growth of China. On the other hand, he said that China has also faced a problem of filling the gap between demand and supply. Regarding China’s security interest in Afghanistan, the author points out that unlike the US, China does not have any interest in military intervention in Afghanistan. This is because, as the author thinks, Chin’s policymakers think that if they send troops to Afghanistan they will turn to terrorist group against China. Based on these points the author made, the upcoming paragraph will present my evaluation and criticism of these points. First, with regard to China’s fundamental policy toward Afghanistan, I agree with the author in the sense that China has been maintaining a good relationship with Afghanistan after 2002. However, there is some change in China’s policy. China has tried to involve in the peace talks of Afghanistan as an intermediary between the Afghan Taliban and Pakistan. Therefore, it should be considered that China has changed its frozen policy to an economical soft policy in Afghanistan. Second, regarding China’s policy in Afghanistan in the context of its relationship with the US and Russia, the author might try to tell the readers that western countries cannot see China’s development in Asia. Yet, according to Ambrish Dhaka (2014), China has remained a silent spectator since 2002 in the reconstruction process of Afghanistan. He stated that both Russia and China have a fundamental agreement not to allow the US or other Western countries in Asia to intervene much in Afghanistan. I consider that China actually tries to have a footprint in its neighbouring countries including Afghanistan which have natural resources. This is due to the fact that China is rapidly growing day by day, and playing a crucial role in both the demand and supply sides in the global economy. Third, regarding China’s security concerns, the author stated China is concerned with the instability of Afghanistan which directly affects China’s security. However, Zhao Huasheng (2016) specified that China is not also concerned about the rising of the Taliban but also about its own terrorist group called Uighur. Since the Uighurs (East Movement of Turkistan) are an ally with the Afghan Taliban, and the Taliban sometimes provide weapons and trained Uighurs, and also China thinks this group comes to Afghanistan for training and fight against China’s government. However, they think that instability and insecurity in Afghanistan will cause that the Uighurs will be independent in Xingjian. Due to the fact, as China has invested a number of projects in Afghanistan, the Chines scholars are concerning the implementation of those projects. Furthermore, Huasheng stated that Afghanistan is like a lock that China can cut off the central, south and west from each other. But, Bukhari stated that China does not have any military policy to send troops in Afghanistan like the USA. This point shows China’s complicated policy toward Afghanistan. As the author stated above, China is just a free rider in Afghanistan in order to grab the natural resources. If we consider this aspect of China’s interest, it may be interpreted that China will exploit the resources of Afghanistan and will not have any policy in the peace talks of Afghanistan. Although China has started an initiative in peace talks in Afghanistan from 2016, these negotiations still don’t have any positive result from the terrorist group side. Considering the above-mentioned points, it is not clear whether China will succeed in peace initiative in Afghanistan to complete its projects. However, we need to note that the article “The Role of China in Economic Stabilization and Reconstruction of Afghanistan” was written in 2012 and that China’s initiative started as recent as in 2016. In this sense, it is suggested that further research should be needed in this area. The future research of this aspect will clarify whether China will be successful in its peace talks in Afghanistan or not because the peace process is still ongoing with the involved counties and the terrorist group.

Bibliography

Huasheng, Z. (2016). Afghanistan and China’s new neighbourhood diplomacy. International Aﬀairs, 891–908. Dhaka, A. (2014). Factoring Central Asia into China’s Afghanistan policy. Journal of Eurasian Studies, 97-106. MoFA, M. (2016, December 26). http://mfa.gov.af/en/news/joint-press-release-of-the-1st-china-afghanistan-pakistan-foreign-ministers-dialogue. Retrieved from http://mfa.gov.af: http://mfa.gov.af/en/news/joint-press-release-of-the-1st-china-afghanistan-pakistan-foreign-ministers-dialogue Guo, Q. (2017). The Principle of Non-interference and China's Role in International Conflict in New ear. Lund University: Department of Science.