CONTEMPORARY EURASIA VIII (2) ContEurVIII2 | Page 65

ARAM ABAJYAN
leading Beijing to seek ways to diversify its energy supplies. At the same
time, US energy independence from the region encouraged the Arab
states to pay more attention to China. 5
China’s involvement and further penetration into the Middle East,
particularly into the Gulf region, was becoming more and more evident
phenomenon. After the 1990s, Beijing’s foreign policy in the region
identified some major objectives. The state-owned Chinese energy
companies, namely China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC),
China National Petrochemical Corporation (Sinopec), and China National
Offshore Oil Corporation (CNOOC), started to seek access to Middle
Eastern oil and gas. 6
Since 2002, the significance of the Middle East increased regarding
Beijing’s calculations for gaining critical hydrocarbon resources. Beijing
found trustworthy partners in the region, helping it fulfill its huge energy
import needs. As part of its energy security strategy, China continued to
seek proper ways and means for strengthening its economic ties with
Middle Eastern oil-rich countries and exporters. For its growing energy
needs, China ensured its energy imports, cooperated with various foreign
customers, while doing its best to maximize Beijing’s access to
hydrocarbon resources under any possible circumstances.
In the 1990s, China launched a new phase of energy-driven
engagement in the Middle East due to a shortage of its domestic oil
production. Beijing’s growing needs and huge demands for oil made the
country supplement them with oil imports. At first, relatively smaller oil
producers in the Middle East became China’s focus as late as 1995. The
Gulf region’s small countries, such as Oman and Yemen, began
providing China with oil. Soon, the region’s “oil giants” surpassed Oman
and Yemen. Saudi Arabia and Iran, the largest oil producers in the Gulf
region, became the top two suppliers of China’s oil in 2003. In the
Middle East, the Gulf states appeared to be the most significant and
promising in Beijing’s energy calculations. 7
In the early part of its new strategy, China only established import
relationships with the two small Gulf States, Oman and Yemen. These
states were producing light crude, which could be handled by China’s

5 Erica
S. Downs, “China-Middle East Energy Relations,” Brookings Institution, June 6,
2013,
https://www.brookings.edu/research/testimony/2013/06/06-china-middle-east-
energy-downs (accessed August 1, 2019).
6 Leverett and Bader, “Managing China-U.S.,” 187.
7 Ibid, 190.
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