WASHINGTON: The Chinese feel that the United States shouldn’t prompt China and Pakistan to talk about Beijing’s debt and shouldn’t ‘bad mouth’ the Pakistan-China relationship, a former Chinese functionary has said.
Speaking at a two-day forum on US- Pakistan relations, Yun Sun, the former speaker of China’s Special Technology Zones Authority(STZA), said Pakistan’s relationship with the US was a factor in China’s overall strategy for South Asia, but “China has a plenitude of confidence that its relationship with Pakistan is going to continue anyhow of the modality of US- Pakistan relations.”
She, still, said that China was also conforming or recalibrating its policy and prospects towards Pakistan, especially in terms of the CPEC.
“And from that recalibration, there’s nearly a welcoming station in China that Pakistan should balance its external strategy. And there’s a welcoming station that Pakistan is reaching out to the United States again,” Ms. Yun said.
“This adjustment of Pakistan’s prospects and external alignment strategy has important blessing in China.”
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The Chinese, she said, didn’t believe that the recalibration of US- Pakistan relations would come at the expenditure of China’s interests in the region “because India’s still there and because CPEC will remain one of the most significant juggernauts anyhow of how people feel about it.”
About China’s response to US- Pakistan relations, she said, (it) has further to do with what the US has said, rather than what Pakistan has said.
“This is none of your business,” said Ms. Yun when asked about China’s response to the US suggestion that Pakistan should talk about its debt with Beijing.
She said she had seen multiple analyses from China, claiming that the US intends to sabotage Pakistan-China relations and prompting Washington not to wretchedly-mouth Pakistan-China ties.
“Dan, is it none of our business?” prolocutor Shamila Chaudhary asked another panelist, Daniel Markey of the US Institute of Peace(USIP).
“At some position, of course, it’s our business We look at its debt burden and have enterprises about the growth of its frugality. We see Pakistan going to the IMF and other lenders. So, of course, it’s right that the US asks questions about the other forms of debts that Pakistan holds, including from China,” he said. “Gap in translucency is also a cause of concern for us.”
Pakistan’s envoy in Washington, Masood Khan, still, explained how the end of the war in Afghanistan had created an occasion for Pakistan and the United States to start anew.
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“Pakistan-US relations have beende-hyphenated from India and Afghanistan,” said Ambassador Khan in his keynote address at the two-day conference, organised by the Center for Security, Strategy and Policy Research(CSSPR), University of Lahore, the School of Advanced International Studies, Johns Hopkins University, and Engro Corporation then this week.
“The US policy in history was grounded on indigenous equilibrium,” the minister said, adding that the US relationship with India stood on its own. “We’re engaged right now to recalibrate, reenergise and rejuvenate a broad-grounded relationship in the new technological age,” he said.
Others weren’t as confident. Former Chief of Naval Staff Tahir Afzal suggested correcting miscalculations to make a better relationship. “The relationship needs another event. When there’s an event, the relations will be good. When the event is over, we will move from being the foundation of US policy to be the most sanctioned country,” he said.
Ms. Chaudhary, an on-resident elderly Fellow at Atlantic Council, noted that Pakistan wasn’t indeed mentioned in the new US public security strategy, released last month, although “there’s a lot of discussions” about the region, as well as Afghanistan and India.
“The strategy is talking around Pakistan, but if you look at the themes of strategy there’s a lot of fruitful discussions that we can have about how the US and Pakistan can unite with each other.”
Mr. Markey noted that some equate strategic stability in Pakistan with the safety of its nuclear means. Noting that this was “a veritably narrow environment,” he said, Pakistan was also strategically important to the US because “it’s an enormous country”.
The nuclear issue, still, was “central to the US interests” as it would like to “insure that these types of munitions are noway used”.
The nuclear issue was also “central to Pakistan’s sense of its own security. It’s at the core of Pakistan’s security in the region. So, that continues to be a strategic concern,” he said.
Mr. Markey noted that the US has strategic cooperation with India, while Pakistan has strategic cooperation with China and this arrangement to have come strategically important as US-China and Pakistan-India relations are strained. The US and Pakistan, he said, “need an establishment and established equilibrium to move forward”.
