Daily Times

Since the end of the Cold War in 1991, Pakistan has been boasting its geostrategic location in South Asia, claiming to be a gateway to Central Asia. We thought that the world needed to access the markets of the Central Asian Republics through Pakistan. Unfortunately, that dream remained unfulfilled because of the perpetual unrest in Afghanistan. Perhaps Pakistan did not realise the significance of becoming a gateway to East Asia where the People’s Republic of China is located. In the context of Pakistan’s geostrategic location, becoming a gateway to China is its first success. However, this is not an isolated move; Pakistan made a sagacious decision to side with China by recognising it as a state in 1950. After that, the interests of both Pakistan and China have coincided, both regionally and internationally.
Pakistan, under President General Pervez Musharraf, decided to enhance cooperation with China in the year 2000. The immediate reason could have been the isolation of Pakistan in the world after Kargil and the economic sanctions imposed on Pakistan. This cooperation was motivated by economic and defence related issues. Pakistan wanted to join East Asian regional economic organisations such as the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation, as China showed interest in Gwadar port. In 2002, Pakistan allowed China to start the construction of Gwadar port. After Musharraf, the leadership of the PPP also focused on enhancing economic cooperation with China and, in March 2008, the inauguration of Gwadar port took place. In the same year, both countries signed an agreement to construct a railway track along the Karakoram Highway to link the rail network of China to Gwadar.
In 2011, on the 60th anniversary of bilateral relations, both countries celebrated the Pak-China Friendship Year. In February 2013, the management of Gwadar port was handed over to the state run Chinese Overseas Port Holding Company and, in July, both countries approved the Pak-China economic corridor project to link Gwadar port with the western part of China. In short, Pakistan has cashed in on China’s desire to have a short land route to the Arabian Sea while China has taken advantage of Pakistan’s longing for economic linkages with it. Shared economic interests have brought both countries closer and have helped them expand cooperation beyond just the defence sector, though the flow of this collaboration is more from China to Pakistan than vice versa.
China now seems more confident about Pakistan’s cooperation in enhancing its economic capacities through the possible traffic (of both goods and oil) coming from Gwadar port. In the past 15 years, Pakistan has resisted the pressure mounted by India and the US to deter it from sharing the fruits of Gwadar port with China. It is quite unprecedented that a country allows its neighbour existing on one border to establish a satellite on its other border. Pakistan has done that. This step will not only help Pakistan reap economic benefits but will also make China more economically competitive.
After Hong Kong joined China through the transfer of sovereignty from the UK to China in 1997 the focus of Eastern China has been industrial growth under a capitalist economic model. In the course of development, the western parts of China have been lagging behind. In this context, the supply of goods and oil through Gwadar port is bound to accelerate the speed of industrial development in western China, which will also enhance its exports to the world and link it to the Gulf and Africa. Incidentally, Pakistan’s western half is also less developed than its eastern half. Hence, the Pak-China economic corridor will bring prosperity to the western halves of both the countries.
A point is being bandied about on whether China’s longing for extraterritorial presence will be viewed in terms of places or bases. Friends of China place their bets on the former while the rivals of China consider it to be the latter. For instance, Pakistan is believed to have offered China a place in Gwadar to establish and enhance China’s competitive economic and commercial edge over the rest of the world. However, China’s rivals, especially those that are concerned about its naval power, believe that China is seeking bases in the Indian Ocean through what is called a ‘string of pearls’, of which Gwadar is one pearl only (the rest of the pearls are the islands belonging to Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Maldives and Somalia) to enhance the reach of the Chinese navy. Rivals try to infer China’s intentions from its actions but are biased because of their own apprehensions.
One of the reasons for this effort to misunderstand China may be because it is unprecedented in history that a country has named its rise “peaceful development”, as China has asserted. China advocates development characterised by mutual trust and benefit. Perhaps the rest of the world believes that economic well-being is counter intuitive to mutuality and cooperation. There must be rivalry causing a loss to one party and benefit to another. However, China believes in win-win cooperation, as it has asserted. The lesson for Pakistan to learn is that the world has gone economic. Now, financial establishments matter more than defence establishments and financial spending has greater value than defence spending. Countries that remained in isolation for centuries are striving hard to come out of the morass of loneliness. Cooperation, not rivalry and conflict, is the key to success in the future.

The writer is a freelance columnist and can be reached at qaisarrashid@yahoo.com