MIDDLE EAST HISTORY POLITICS CULTURE XIII MIDDLE EAST XIII | Page 172

ARAM ABAJYAN
(IOS NAS RA)
CHINA’S DIPLOMATIC AND STRATEGIC MOVES IN THE
MIDDLE EAST DURING THE COLD WAR PERIOD
The article analyzes China’s strategic involvement, fundamental
interests and foreign policy objectives in the Middle East during the second
half of the 20th century. Examination of main facts, tendencies and patterns
is important in order to completely understand the development of Sino-Arab
relations. This phenomenon can be useful for making some basic predictions
about future ties. Thus, China’s diplomatic and strategic moves in the region
during the Cold War period will be examined. In fact, the evolution of
Beijing’s foreign policy in the Middle East is not thoroughly investigated, and
we can argue, that the debate among the scholars about this issue has been
conducted in a historical vacuum. The debate is mainly focused around how
the Chinese are acting while having participation in the region’s affairs.
Moreover, the validity of Chinese policy here has been examined less
carefully. A deep analysis of Chinese foreign policy in the Middle East can
help us to fill in some of these important gaps. As we know, China has
neither borders nor military troops in the Middle East. At the same time,
there is no state or government in the region called ‘pro-Chinese’, in the same
way, that some governments are known as ‘pro-American’ or ‘pro-Russian.’
Chinese influence on revolutionary movements in the region has been weak
and minimal as well. On the other side, the region of the Middle East has
never been as significant for China as, for instance, Asian region or the Soviet
Union. Nevertheless, as a growing socialist power, the People’s Republic of
China (PRC) aimed to present its huge potential in the Middle East,
attempting to spread its influence both in political and economic issues.
From the historical point of view, one of the keystones of Communist
China’s engagement and further policy development in the Middle East
started with its full sympathy and support of the Algerian liberation
movement. Even before the National Liberation Front (FLN) had created to
liberate the country from the French rule (November 1, 1954), China already
had exerted all its efforts to support the Algerians. They recognized the
Algerian FLN and the Palestinian movement even before the Soviet Union
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