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China plans to cooperate with Saudi Arabia and other Gulf countries on nuclear energy, nuclear security and space exploration, President Xi Jinping said on Friday, showing his nation’s strengthening ties with a region once firmly in the US sphere of influence.
Xi was speaking in the Saudi capital, Riyadh, at a summit with rulers and officials of the six Gulf Cooperation Council countries — Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates — during a three-day visit to Saudi Arabia. . Later on Friday, he held his third and final summit of the visit with other Arab and African leaders.
Both China and Saudi Arabia described Xi’s visit this week as a historic event that ushers in a new era of relations between Beijing and the Middle East, a region that once had a largely oil-based relationship with China, the Gulf’s main consumer of fossil fuels. of exports.
Arab states are increasingly building broader ties with China that extend to arms sales, technology transfers and infrastructure projects. Chinese companies are building new cities in Egypt and Saudi Arabia, selling facial recognition technology to Gulf governments and collaborating with them on artificial intelligence research. Beijing has also expanded its maritime footprint in the region, an important channel for its Belt and Road Initiative and a route needed to reach trading partners in Europe.
“Working with many parties is what will propel us and the world to a new phase of growth and prosperity,” Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan told a news conference on Friday, stressing that the kingdom’s partnership with the United States remained important. and that they refused to choose a side. “We cannot build this growth and prosperity by distancing ourselves from opportunities on one side or the other,” he said.
In his speech on Friday, Xi said China and the Gulf countries would establish a joint “forum” for the peaceful use of nuclear energy, as well as a China-Gulf Nuclear Security Center.
Saudi officials have spent years working on a civilian nuclear program as they try to reduce their reliance on oil, and want to enrich the kingdom’s uranium reserves, which they say are large enough to allow exports. But they have not yet awarded the contract for the country’s first nuclear power plants, a bidding process in which the Chinese company has been invited to join, along with Korean and Russian firms.
U.S. intelligence agencies have scrutinized the Saudi effort, and analysts have questioned whether it could evolve into weapons fuel production capabilities, though others say those concerns are overblown or far from it.
China also wants closer cooperation with the Gulf countries in space research and infrastructure, and is discussing the establishment of a joint lunar and deep space research center, Xi said. His country will help the Gulf states train their own astronauts, who will be welcomed on the Chinese space station to work with Chinese astronauts and conduct scientific experiments, he added.
Space is an area of particular interest to Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, the 37-year-old de facto ruler of Saudi Arabia, an avid sci-fi fan who established the kingdom’s first space commission in 2018.
Xi said he was also keen for Gulf countries to use the Shanghai Oil and Natural Gas Exchange to settle oil and gas contracts in Chinese currency, according to an Arabic translation of a speech he gave to Gulf leaders carried by the official Saudi Press Agency.
Saudi Arabia is the world’s largest exporter of crude oil, which is priced mainly in US dollars. A move away from that could reduce the dollar’s global dominance, although Saudi Arabia is unlikely to make any major changes as it pegs its currency to the dollar.
Saudi Arabia has long been a close ally of the United States, but its ties to China are expanding rapidly. On Thursday, Xi signed a “comprehensive strategic partnership” with King Salman of Saudi Arabia.
On the other hand, the kingdom’s relations with the United States have been particularly strained in recent years, as President Joe Biden vowed on the campaign trail to treat the kingdom as a “pariah” and pressured Crown Prince Mohammed over the killing of Jamal Khashoggi, Washington columnist post and a Saudi citizen were killed by Saudi agents in Istanbul in 2018.
Asked what Saudi Arabia’s new agreements with China mean for its relationship with the US, Prince Faisal, the foreign minister, said Arab-Chinese ties “were not born today” and that China was already the largest trading partner for many countries in the region.
“Going into polarization is very negative,” he said. “We pursue our interests.” Our interests are in the West, and our interests are in the East.
Energy is among China’s top priorities in the Gulf over the next three to five years, Xi said during his speech, adding that China will continue to import large amounts of crude oil from Gulf countries and plans to increase natural gas imports.
China needs a steady supply of fossil fuels to keep its economy, the world’s second largest, moving. That was underscored by volatile energy prices following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine this year and China’s energy crisis last year that blacked out cities and factories.
China is also eager to work with Gulf governments to strengthen cooperation on 5G and 6G technology for broadband cellular networks, Xi said on Friday.
US officials have repeatedly raised concerns about Gulf allies working with Huawei, the Chinese telecommunications giant that signed an agreement with the Saudi ministry on Thursday as part of a visit.
But Gulf officials often complain that US cooperation comes with limitations, such as criticism of its human rights record.
China is a “rising power” with great economic and technological opportunities and Arab countries want to benefit from it, Arab League Secretary General Ahmed Abul Gheit said. “Especially,” he added, “because they don’t offer it to you with conditions.”
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