China plays the Iran card
Skip to main content
  • Home
  • Economy
    • Aviation
    • Bazaar
    • Budget
    • Industry
    • NBR
    • RMG
    • Corporates
  • Stocks
  • Analysis
  • World+Biz
  • Sports
  • Features
    • Book Review
    • Brands
    • Earth
    • Explorer
    • Fact Check
    • Family
    • Food
    • Game Reviews
    • Good Practices
    • Habitat
    • Humour
    • In Focus
    • Luxury
    • Mode
    • Panorama
    • Pursuit
    • Wealth
    • Wellbeing
    • Wheels
  • Epaper
  • More
    • Subscribe
    • Videos
    • Thoughts
    • Splash
    • Bangladesh
    • Supplement
    • Infograph
    • Archive
    • COVID-19
    • Games
    • Long Read
    • Interviews
    • Offbeat
    • Podcast
    • Quiz
    • Tech
    • Trial By Trivia
    • Magazine
  • বাংলা
The Business Standard

Thursday
February 09, 2023

Sign In
Subscribe
  • Home
  • Economy
    • Aviation
    • Bazaar
    • Budget
    • Industry
    • NBR
    • RMG
    • Corporates
  • Stocks
  • Analysis
  • World+Biz
  • Sports
  • Features
    • Book Review
    • Brands
    • Earth
    • Explorer
    • Fact Check
    • Family
    • Food
    • Game Reviews
    • Good Practices
    • Habitat
    • Humour
    • In Focus
    • Luxury
    • Mode
    • Panorama
    • Pursuit
    • Wealth
    • Wellbeing
    • Wheels
  • Epaper
  • More
    • Subscribe
    • Videos
    • Thoughts
    • Splash
    • Bangladesh
    • Supplement
    • Infograph
    • Archive
    • COVID-19
    • Games
    • Long Read
    • Interviews
    • Offbeat
    • Podcast
    • Quiz
    • Tech
    • Trial By Trivia
    • Magazine
  • বাংলা
THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 09, 2023
China plays the Iran card

Analysis

Vali Nasr and Ariane Tabatabai, Project Syndicate
01 August, 2020, 08:30 am
Last modified: 01 August, 2020, 10:49 am

Related News

  • US, UK and Australia carry out China-focused air drills
  • Biden says Xi faces 'enormous problems'
  • Australia to remove Chinese-made cameras from defence sites
  • Biden says US not seeking conflict with China, despite balloon flap
  • US sites of interest visited by past Chinese balloons, Pentagon says

China plays the Iran card

Vali Nasr and Ariane Tabatabai, Project Syndicate
01 August, 2020, 08:30 am
Last modified: 01 August, 2020, 10:49 am
China plays the Iran card

Earlier this month, Iran announced that it is negotiating a 25-year agreement with China encompassing trade, energy, infrastructure, telecommunications, and even military cooperation. For Iran, the prospect of a strategic partnership with China comes at a critical time. The Iranian government has been confronting popular discontent over a sinking domestic economy, which has been battered by American sanctions and, now, COVID-19.

Making matters worse, a recent series of explosions across the country has deepened the sense that the regime is under siege. Damaging at least two sites associated with the Iranian nuclear and missile programs, these incidents appear to be part of a broader strategy by the United States and Israel to cripple Iran's capabilities.

News of a large deal with China is thus a welcome diversion for the Iranian government, and may even buy it time to maintain the status quo until the November 2020 US presidential election. The outcome of that contest will determine the trajectory of US-Iranian relations and the fate of the 2015 Iran nuclear deal, known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), while also influencing Iran's own presidential election in June 2021.

To be sure, Iranians historically have been averse to aligning too closely with any great power, and they are even less willing to accept economic tutelage. With Iran's relationship with China already a source of domestic controversy, it is possible that the country's parliament will refuse to ratify the deal unless it is revised to meet certain concerns.

But Iran's economy has been in free-fall since 2018, when the Trump administration withdrew from the JCPOA and launched its "maximum pressure" campaign of heavy sanctions designed to squeeze the regime. Moreover, with the regime as a whole facing a public backlash, Iranian President Hassan Rouhani's government has been under tremendous internal pressure. The announcement of a deal with China allows Rouhani's government to demonstrate that it is not putting all its eggs in the Western basket. The message to the Iranian people is they are not isolated, and may even enjoy economic improvements despite US sanctions.

At the international level, Iran has always sought to balance one great power against another. Over the past decade, in response to US diplomatic and economic pressure, its security forces looked to Russia, key economic sectors looked to China, and the Rouhani government reached out to Europe. Now, with Sino-American tensions rising, Iran is looking to China to shore up its economy and balance the US. Closer ties with China would give Iran more leverage in future talks with the US and Europe when it comes to revising or restoring the JCPOA, as well as in its dealings with regional rivals such as Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.

By contrast, a strategic partnership with Iran is a minefield for China. Although China continues to trade with Iran and invest in the country's infrastructure, a deepening of ties could raise America's ire at a critical and increasingly sensitive diplomatic juncture. By potentially exposing itself to US sanctions, China risks losing some access to the US market (which is far larger than that of Iran). Not surprisingly, Chinese officials have been relatively quieter about the negotiations than their Iranian counterparts have been. Likewise, China does not want to upset its regional partnerships with Israel or Saudi Arabia, each of which is currently engaged in proxy wars with and covert operations against Iran.

Nonetheless, China obviously sees some value in forging a comprehensive arrangement with Iran – a large, important regional player whose vast energy resources and tremendous economic potential make it a natural candidate for China's westward-looking Belt and Road Initiative. China already buys discounted oil from Iran – not exactly a negligible benefit for the world's foremost consumer of energy – and has become Iran's key trading partner, including as a principal supplier of heavy machinery and manufacturing goods.

More broadly, China has steadily increased its interest in West Asia over the past decade. It is the chief sponsor of the regional Shanghai Cooperation Organization, and it has invested upwards of $57 billion in Pakistan. With the US set to leave Afghanistan, a partnership with Iran will give China a near-stranglehold over the strategic corridor stretching from Central Asia to the Arabian Sea.

As part of this expansion, China could even gain control of the Iranian port of Chahbahar, which its main Asian rival, India, has been developing in response to China's development of the nearby Pakistani port of Gwador. The Chahbahar port allows India to circumvent Pakistan – another rival – in its trade with Central Asia. But, despite the port's recognized importance, US sanctions are forcing India out of Chahbahar and frustrating Iran. In fact, Iran is already reportedly forcing India out of a railway project that bypasses Pakistan to connect with Afghanistan and Central Asia. News of that rupture came just after China and Iran announced a preliminary deal.

The recent border skirmishes between China and India show just how seriously China takes its footprint in West Asia. In addition to opening the door for China to control Chahbahar and monopolize trade routes into Central Asia, the deal also appears to offer opportunities for China to develop naval facilities on the Gulf of Oman. Though the US has long wanted to shift away from the Middle East to focus more on China, the emerging Sino-Iranian deal reminds us that the two theaters are by no means separate.

By increasing pressure on both China and Iran, the US has encouraged the two countries to forge a common front. Though the Sino-Iranian a relationship is still a long way from becoming a new axis, the recent negotiations show that such an arrangement is possible.

American foreign policymakers should take note. The US will need to try placing a wedge between China and Iran, which requires deciding which one poses the greater threat. Americans may want nothing more than to leave the Middle East once and for all. But the fact is that the strategic competition with China will not play out only in East Asia.

Vali Nasr is Professor of Middle East Studies and International Affairs at Johns Hopkins University's School of Advanced International Studies. Ariane Tabatabai is a Middle East fellow at the Alliance for Securing Democracy at the German Marshall Fund of the United States and a senior research scholar at the Columbia University School of International and Public Affairs

Top News

china / Iran

Comments

While most comments will be posted if they are on-topic and not abusive, moderation decisions are subjective. Published comments are readers’ own views and The Business Standard does not endorse any of the readers’ comments.

Top Stories

  • Photo: PID
    Rail connectivity will ease Dhaka's traffic jam, says PM
  • 5.2 magnitude earthquake hits Indonesia, 4 killed
    5.2 magnitude earthquake hits Indonesia, 4 killed
  • Bangladesh to publish quarterly GDP data before IMF deadline
    Bangladesh to publish quarterly GDP data before IMF deadline

MOST VIEWED

  • People stand in front of collapsed buildings following an earthquake in Kahramanmaras, Turkey, 3 February, 2023. Photo: Reuters
    Why is Turkey an earthquake hot spot?
  • The megaproject Rooppur Nuclear Power Plant has a debt of Tk90,474 crore. Photo: Courtesy
    Projects funded with debt need to be selected prudently, and implemented timely
  • Some tough tasks on the plate for Bangladesh Bank!
    Some tough tasks on the plate for Bangladesh Bank!
  • Having sufficient reserves, strong social security needed to be safe in bad time
    Having sufficient reserves, strong social security needed to be safe in bad time
  • Resilience should be built to cope with long-term implications
    Resilience should be built to cope with long-term implications
  • Why 2012 reforms were not done is a million-dollar question
    Why 2012 reforms were not done is a million-dollar question

Related News

  • US, UK and Australia carry out China-focused air drills
  • Biden says Xi faces 'enormous problems'
  • Australia to remove Chinese-made cameras from defence sites
  • Biden says US not seeking conflict with China, despite balloon flap
  • US sites of interest visited by past Chinese balloons, Pentagon says

Features

Google’s investment bodes well for Ireland’s economy.Photographer: Hollie Adams/Bloomberg

Layoffs alone won’t solve tech's problems

3h | Panorama
Mirsarai Autism Centre has been established to facilitate 7,000 disabled, autistic children at a distant village of Mirsarai upazila. Photo Minhaj Uddin

Children are everyone's business

8h | Panorama
Caption1: One of Shaker Ibne Amin’s earliest and most favourite builds which he calls the ‘Soul’. Photo: Saikat Roy

3Monkey: Making the dream custom bike for every rider

7h | Wheels
Chinese automobile manufacturers dominate the 2023 Dhaka Motor Fest

Chinese automobile manufacturers dominate the 2023 Dhaka Motor Fest

6h | Wheels

More Videos from TBS

Quake death toll rising, passes 15,000

Quake death toll rising, passes 15,000

5m | TBS World
Ekushey book fair to see fewer releases this year

Ekushey book fair to see fewer releases this year

5h | TBS Stories
Sirajdikhan's delicious Patkhir is also in demand abroad

Sirajdikhan's delicious Patkhir is also in demand abroad

6h | TBS Stories
LeBron James NBA's all-time highest scorer

LeBron James NBA's all-time highest scorer

6h | TBS SPORTS

Most Read

1
Photo: Courtesy
Panorama

From 'Made in Bangladesh' to 'Designed in Bangladesh'

2
Master plan for futuristic Chattogram city in the making
Districts

Master plan for futuristic Chattogram city in the making

3
Photo: Collected
Crime

Prime Distribution MD Mamun arrested in fraud case

4
Maqsuda Begum made new executive director of Bangladesh Bank
Banking

Maqsuda Begum made new executive director of Bangladesh Bank

5
Photo: Rajib Dhar/TBS
Bangladesh

HSC results to be published Wednesday

6
30% companies see double-digit growth even in hard times
Economy

30% companies see double-digit growth even in hard times

EMAIL US
[email protected]
FOLLOW US
WHATSAPP
+880 1847416158
The Business Standard
  • About Us
  • Contact us
  • Sitemap
  • Privacy Policy
  • Comment Policy
Copyright © 2023
The Business Standard All rights reserved
Technical Partner: RSI Lab

Contact Us

The Business Standard

Main Office -4/A, Eskaton Garden, Dhaka- 1000

Phone: +8801847 416158 - 59

Send Opinion articles to - [email protected]

For advertisement- [email protected]