For a course of friendship

CHINA has not only affirmed its credentials as "a staunch force for peace in the world" but also asserted that "the importance of friendship between China and India is immeasurable for Asian countries as well as for the world". These and other nuances of China's foreign policy were evident in the comments made by Prime Minister Wen Jiabao and Foreign Minister Li Zhaoxing during the annual session of the Chinese Parliament, the National People's Congress (NPC).

The NPC session itself was dominated by the deliberations on the new anti-secession Bill which, while being a domestic matter with reference to the future of Taiwan, sent out strong signals to the non-sovereign territory's "friend and ally", the United States, about China's political resolve over the issue.

It was essentially in this context that Li said the Chinese and the Americans should opt for a "long-term and strategic perspective", with the U.S., in particular, doing so, "first of all", in regard to Taiwan, "the most sensitive issue" in Beijing's evolving equation with Washington. He was emphatic in maintaining that "it is essential to abide by the principles enshrined in the three Sino-U.S. joint communiques, treat each other as equals, seek common ground while putting aside the differences, and expand the converging points of the interests of the two peoples".

The substantive catch-phrases relate to Li's suggestion that the U.S. should treat China as an "equal" and that the "converging points of the interests" should be expanded.

While it is no small order to ask the world's sole superpower of the day to treat China on an "equal" footing, the suggestion about expanding the convergence of interests has something to do with Beijing's desire to play roles befitting its size and potential influence on the global stage.

Li's insistence on America's continued adherence to its communiques with China is a measure of the persistent tension in the bilateral equation. However, he noted that the two countries "are working in collaboration" to strengthen "the constructive and cooperative partnership" that their Presidents had agreed upon some time ago.

This mix of positive and negative trends on the China-U.S. front is also illustrated by the fact that some people in the U.S. are still responsive to the faded chimes of the Cold War-era time machine. Noting this reality, Li pointed out that only "a very small number of people" in the U.S. were now propagating "unfounded and unscientific theories" about China as "a threat" to American global interests.

Dismissing the "China threat" theory in some sections of the U.S. - the residual Sino-phobia - as untenable, Li pointed out that Washington's defence budget for fiscal 2004 was "17.8 times the Chinese figure", while the per capita military expenditure in the U.S. was "77 times the Chinese one". Not only that. Accounting for 47 per cent of the global total of national defence budgets in 2003, the U.S. spent "3.5 times the add-up of the military expenditure of the other four permanent members of the United Nations Security Council", China included, Li emphasised.

Given this imbalance, much is read into China's insistence on being treated by the U.S. as an "equal" and is indeed read so beyond the basic principle of equality among the sovereign member-states of the United Nations. The issue of U.S.-China equality acquires importance in the context of the assessments by some international experts on China, such as Jean-Pierre Cabestan, that Beijing is indeed in favour of "an asymmetrical multi-polarity" on the global stage. This simply means the preference for a multiplicity of major powers, with China alone being the potential or real "equal" of the U.S.

The bigger international debate about the place of China in any new world order is still wide open. The fact remains, though, that Chinese leaders have begun to address their relations with the major powers and others, within and outside the U.N., in a serious fashion, ahead of any possible reforms of the global organisation, with particular reference to the Security Council.

Li noted that the Chinese frontier with Russia "has become a boundary of peace, friendship and cooperation". Both he and Wen Jiabao called upon Japan and the U.S. not to expand the scope of their Cold War-era military alliance, purely a "bilateral" affair, to cover the issues of Asia-Pacific security in the context of the Taiwan question. The two also asked Japan to address its problematic relationship with China by "taking history as a mirror and looking to the future".

While China's ties with the European Union, especially in the current context of the debate about the E.U. arms embargo against Beijing, and the centrality of the North Korean nuclear issue in East Asia, were not lost sight of, Wen's views on India came as a major foreign policy pronouncement at the time of the NPC session.

A preview of Wen's planned visit to India is best told in his own words at a press conference in Beijing on March 14. Affirming that his primary objective was to chart a course of "friendship" with India "from a strategic and comprehensive perspective" and calling for a "fair, reasonable" settlement of the bilateral boundary dispute, he emphasised his belief that the China-India relationship "has entered a new stage".

Expressing the view that the upcoming 55th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between China and India "will become a new point of departure for deeper friendship and better cooperation between the two countries", Wen said a "(boundary) solution that is acceptable to both sides should be found on the basis of equal consultation, mutual understanding and mutual accommodation, respect for history and accommodation of reality".

The three main objectives of his prospective visit to India would be to update the ties from a "strategic" perspective, promote economic engagement for "common development" and set "principles for solving the historical legacy of [the] boundary issue".

With the bilateral engagement having already hit the right track in this post-Cold-War period (Frontline, December 17, 2004), Wen's categorical affirmation is significant: "China and India are not competitors. We are friends."