The Xinhua news agency has come out with a nuanced commentary on the implications of the European Union sanctions against Iran. The commentary keeps China’s thinking and approach to the emergent situation under wraps and blithely immerses itself in the realms of speculation. Tehran won’t like its tone, which is that China is hedging despite all those brave opinion pieces in the recent weeks as to where Beijing’s principled and unwavering stance lies.
The Xinhua commentary makes the following points: A) The EU sanctions constitute a heavy blow for Iran’s economy no matter its pretensions to the contrary. B) The US and EU are together in this — that is, China doesn’t buy Iran’s thesis that EU is a divided house. C) However, there is no certainty that Iran will buckle under pressure on the nuclear issue, given its objective of gaining mastery over full nuclear fuel cycle. D) EU has left loop holes in the sanctions regime so that oil trade is not affected immediately and a point of no return is not reached. E) Iran, in turn, may also try to ease tensions with the west. F) Iran may cultivate non-European markets — Turkey, Japan, South Korea and India have been mentioned (but not China, which increased its oil imports from Iran by 30% last year.) G) EU is preoccupied with its economic crisis and the Iran sanctions is a sideshow. H) No big rise in oil price is expected in immediate terms although increase in price is likely in the medium term.
Why such a commentary with such a high dose of glasnost? The most charitable explanation could be that Beijing is thinking hard over an evolving situation where the two parties — west and Iran — are notorious for their pragmatism. Meanwhile, it is a bit of “psywar”, too, to put Tehran on the backfoot while the Chinese negotiators are driving a hard bargain on the pricing for this year’s contracts for purchase of Iranian oil.
Reports say Chinese negotiators are dragging their feet and stretching the bargaining so as to strike a deal from a position of advantage. In sum, China sees Iranians in some distress and would expect them to sell their crown jewels at a bargain price. This is going to be a testy period for China-Iran relations, since both protagonists possess legendary skills in the art of the bazaar. Xinhua commentary is here.
This Chinese regime is a multi-legged creature (maybe four or more legs) and it has its legs in different boats. I think they call this pragmatism.
Love it!
The biggist loosers in all this, will be (even more in future) economically depressed West.
I knew, that China will try to cash in on this situation.
Prepare for VERY big changes, on the world scene folks!
Some who were up will go down, soon!
Nice article and always pleasure to read, thank you!
Insightful thoughts