Factbox: Links between Pakistan and China
(Reuters) – Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao will aim to reassure Pakistan on a visit beginning on Friday that energy, military and economic ties remain tight, despite China’s warming relations with India, where he has just spent two days.
Here are some facts about relations between the long-term partners:
“ALL-WEATHER” PARTNERS
* China and Pakistan call each other “all-weather friends” and their close ties have been underpinned by longstanding wariness of their common neighbor, India, and a desire to hedge against U.S. influence in the region.
* China is Pakistan’s main supplier of conventional arms, and analysts believe China has supported Pakistan’s nuclear weapons program in past decades.
* Pakistan’s Chief of Army Staff General Ashfaq Kayani visited China last month, and in December the two countries held a military drill in China which they described as aimed at honing their ability to respond to militant attacks.
* In November, Pakistan announced it would arm its JF-17 fighter aircraft fleet with Chinese SD-10 air-to-air missiles after France declined to sell missiles to equip them. “PAF has no plans to install Western devices and weapons on the aircraft for the time being,” Pakistani air force (PAF) chief, Air Chief Marshal Rao Qamar Suleman, told reporters at the time.
* China helped Pakistan build its main nuclear power generation facility at Chashma in Punjab province, and is completing a second reactor there. It has plans to build two more.
* China also helped build the deep-sea Gwadar port on Pakistan’s Arabian Sea coast, partly with a view to opening up an energy and trade corridor from the Gulf, across Pakistan to western China.
* The United States is also a close partner of Pakistan, but analysts say Pakistan sees China as a counterweight to the West. According to a Pew survey of Pakistan opinion last year, 84 percent of respondents said they had a favorable few of China, and 16 percent had a favorable view of the United States.
ECONOMIC HOPES
* Annual two-way trade was worth $6.8 billion in 2009, according to Pakistan. Trade flows run heavily in China’s favor. It exported goods worth $5.5 billion to Pakistan and imported $1.3 billion worth from there. The two countries have set a target of $15 billion by 2011, helped by free trade agreements.
* But the global financial crisis and Pakistan’s frayed economy have frustrated those ambitions, and Pakistan’s growth and trade lag India’s.
* Chinese companies are involved in telecommunications, hydropower, mining and highway projects in Pakistan.
* As well as the Gwadar port, China helped build the Karakoram Highway, which connects northern Pakistan to western China. The road could be upgraded to provide a conduit for Chinese energy imports.
SECURITY CONCERNS
* China has urged mainly Muslim Pakistan to take action against ethnic Uighur militants from the western Chinese region of Xinjiang who have slipped in to Pakistan in past years.
* On July 5, 2009, deadly violence broke out between Muslim Uighurs and Han Chinese in China’s Xinjiang region, killing 197 people, many of them Han residents attacked by Uighurs. Pakistan deplored the riots, winning praise from China for its stance.
* The safety of Chinese nationals working in Pakistan is a
major concern for China. Several Chinese workers have been killed in militant attacks in Pakistan in recent years.