BEIJING – President Donald Trump’s meeting with China’s Xi Jinping is set to face new tensions after a US-Israeli attack on Iran that killed a China-friendly supreme leader.
It is the second time in two months that the United States has taken military action against one of China’s key economic partners, following the surprise capture of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro in January.
But despite warm ties with Venezuela, China has largely limited its response to tough statements, such as it did after the attack in Caracas.
China is “proving to be an unabashed friend to its authoritarian allies,” Nicholas Burns, the US ambassador to China under President Joe Biden, said at X.
While China is concerned about the Iran conflict, experts say it is not worth jeopardizing Trump’s upcoming visit, which the White House says will begin on March 31. Both Trump and Xi are trying to expand a fragile trade deal between the world’s two largest economies.
Beijing has yet to confirm dates for the trip, which could come as the US is still engrossed in the Iran operation, which Trump said could last “four to five weeks” or longer.
“I have not heard of any plans to delay or derail that visit,” Wang Huao, founder and president of the Center for China and Globalization, a non-governmental think tank in Beijing, told NBC News in an interview on Wednesday.
If anything, the Iran conflict gives even more urgency to the meeting between China, the Middle East’s largest trading partner, and the US, the region’s largest security partner.
Although China has long opposed Tehran’s pursuit of nuclear weapons, it has acted as a lifeline for heavily sanctioned Iran, a “comprehensive strategic partner” that will sign a 25-year cooperation agreement in 2021.
About 80% of Iran’s crude oil exports go to China, the world’s largest energy importer, which helps keep Tehran’s economy afloat. But China is not dependent on Tehran, Iranian oil accounts for only 13% of China’s total oil imports.
The China-Iran relationship is mainly “experimental” in nature, said Pei Yang, an assistant professor of Arabic studies at George Mason University in Virginia who studies China’s historical and cultural ties with the Middle East.
“It’s not based on ideological criteria or perspective,” he said. “It’s based more on financial interest.”
China – which has confirmed the death of one of its citizens in Tehran and evacuated 3,000 others from Iran – has criticized the US-Israeli strikes as a violation of Iran’s sovereignty and international law. Foreign Minister Wang Yi said the assassination of Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and the “instigation of regime change” were “unacceptable”.
But so far, China has not contributed much to Iran beyond rhetoric, underscoring its lack of readiness to challenge US military action around the world.
“These countries are not delusional. They know they cannot rely on China as a security partner,” said Ahmed Aboudouh, a fellow in the Middle East and North Africa program at London’s Chatham House research institute. “They see it as a development partner, an economic partner, a trade partner, a technological partner, but not a military one.”
Beijing criticized Iran’s response to the attacks, which “have direct implications for China’s strategic interests,” Aboudouh said.
In a call Monday with Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi, Wang urged Iran to “take into account the legitimate concerns of neighboring countries.”
China has major investments in energy-rich Gulf states such as Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, where Iran’s retaliatory strikes have hit civilian targets.
If it could easily replace its Iranian oil imports, China would get half of its oil from the Middle East as a whole. Iran’s shutdown of the Strait of Hormuz, a narrow shipping lane that carries a fifth of the world’s oil production, “could be a big shock to China’s oil supply,” Yang said.
However, China could benefit if the US becomes embroiled in a protracted conflict in the Middle East. That would “relieve some of the strategic pressure” from Washington on China’s military build-up in the Asia-Pacific, said William Yang, senior analyst for Northeast Asia at the International Crisis Group.
A distracted US could leave an opening for Chinese aggression in Taiwan, a self-governing island democracy that Beijing claims as its territory. The US is Taiwan’s main arms supplier and international supporter, but has long maintained a policy of strategic ambiguity about whether it will defend the island from Chinese attacks.
A protracted conflict could also deplete US munitions stockpiles that act as a deterrent against Chinese military action, said Yang, who is based in Taiwan’s capital, Taipei.
The war in Iran will further China’s efforts to present itself as an alternative to American global leadership.
The Global South is losing faith in the Trump administration because its actions in Venezuela and Iran show that “coercion is on the table and can be used anytime,” Aboudouh said.
For now, China is taking a wait-and-see approach and will adapt as the situation in Iran evolves, experts said.
While the pro-American regime in Iran may present some challenges, Crisis Group’s Yang said, “Beijing will eventually be able to build a pragmatic new relationship with whoever comes to power in Tehran.”
Janice Mackey Frayer reported from Beijing and Jennifer Jett from Hong Kong.
