Mar
13
China, Darfur, and Oil
March 13, 2008 | | Leave a Comment
By Cindy Ru
The earliest oil exploration in Sudan started in the 1960s and in 1974 Chevron and Shell began their oil drilling in the country, according to this time line compiled on the sudanupdate website. But it was not until in 1999 when Sudan completed a major oil pipeline that the country’s oil export began to take its full gear. From the U.S. Energy Information Administration Analysis, Sudan’s oil export revenue accounts for 70% of its total export revenue. Also, numbers from the oil and gas journal suggests the estimated proven oil reserve in Sudan increased nearly nine-fold from 563 million barrels in 2006 to 5 billion in Jan 2007. But because the Sudan National Petroleum Corporation has certain technical and financial problems to undertake the oil exploration task on its own, so it established joint venture with mainly Asian companies, and of course, the China National Petroleum Corporation(CNPC) is a major force. Looking at this Oil Map showing the international companies that have petroleum holdings in Central&Southern Sudan, CNPC is taking three big blocks of the oil concessions.
Many advocates on human rights and especially on the Darfur issue argue that Beijing’s close relationship with Khartoum has very much to do with China’s growing appetite for energy and its quest to lock up the huge oil export potential in Africa. And in light of the Darfur crisis, this is a major reason why the Chinese government adopted a somewhat ambiguous attitude and oppose to imposing sanctions against Sudan. Some western scholars see China adopting an aid-for-oil strategy in Africa-”Beijing aggressively courts the governments of those countries with diplomacy, trade deals, debt forgiveness, and aid packages”- and they conclude the strategy is working very well. Elizabeth Economy, C.V. Starr Senior Fellow and Director for Asia Studies at the Council on Foreign Relations, puts it even more bluntly,”China is very deeply engaged in exploiting Africa’s oil resources.”
But how do Chinese people see this matter?
Last week in a comment to my post about “china on Darfur: accusation and defense”, meryam pointed to a very interesting article on Global Voices called “China:Spielberg, the Olympics, and Oil”. John Kennedy translated a post from a famous Chinese blogger Hecaitou(和菜头）in which he talked about the Darfur crisis, China’s role in it and his take on the Oil accusation to China by way of jest.
He wrote about China’s historical friendship with Africa:
“Thunder boomed across the land in 2005 when oil was discovered in Darfur’s southern region. And large reserves; after extraction got underway, 200,000 barrels a day by some estimates. The 20 years prior to this had absolutely nothing to do with China, but from that point on, the words Sudan and Darfur got stuck right next to China.
Since 1949, China and Africa had established positive relations. What the deal is now, I don’t know. But at the time, the African brothers were definitely not treated as outsiders. You help get us into the United Nations, and we’ll help you with infrastructure. China had large numbers of cooperative projects in Africa, and relations with most African countries were pretty good. There was no thought of benefits or advantages to this at the time; The engineering teams who went to aid in construction, now that was menial work, trying to do good. Medical teams went to provide health services, and saved countless lives. Sudan was one of China’s African brothers, and now that oil has been discovered, the sense of brotherhood towards Africa that the old generation of proletarian revolutionaries carry is finally being realized.”
On why China is accused in the Darfur matter:
“Little George Bush shrewdly grasped onto this, declaring the Sudanese government wholly responsible for the Darfur Crisis. What’s more, America and its allies one-by-one spoke out: ‘Hey, China, yeah you! Your little brother’s gone and made such a mess, why aren’t you saying anything?’ Seeing China unresponsive, and continuing to ship oil, everybody started screaming at once: ‘everyone come look! The little black people are being killed, and it’s all because China secretly supports the Sudanese government!’”
And what does he think about the accusation:
“The problem, looking at this from China’s point of view, is ‘do we denounce the Sudanese government?’ Well, does China still want the oil? China is a country which has already transitioned to full reliance on oil imports, and where does the gasoline and diesel we burn up every year come from—Daqing, or Karamay? Of course it’s a problem that the blacks in Darfur are being attacked, being massacred. Well, the gas tanks of the cars and wallets of car owners on China’s roads are problems as well. With any humanitarian spirit, the Sudanese government should be denounced. But, once the denunciation is done, what are we gonna burn then? Denouncing the Sudanese government, supporting the people of Darfur, I imagine everybody would raise their hand for both. But, to say that for the people of Darfur, we would rather go without gasoline, or endure much higher fuel prices and overall hikes in commodity prices, would anybody still raise their hand for that? When it involves vital interests, we might see things differently as we consider the problem. Would you choose three years of a lagging economy if it meant not another person in Darfur would have to die?”
“We live in a world that’s just as cruel now as it was 5,000 years ago. In this world it seems numbers of nuclear warheads and supply and demand determine rank between nations. How America lets Americans live such wonderful lives is an example set for all countries to follow, but, this kind of domestic policy isn’t allowed to extend to international relations. If you honestly feel so guilty about the blacks of Darfur, that’s commendable, but what’s even more commendable is if you were to give up your own cars, and started riding bicycles. If you admit that you’re selfish, and that cheap gas depends on the lives of a group of people tens of thousands of miles away, well then there’s no need at all to feel ashamed. Because, that’s just how pitiless the world is, and there’s no obligation to put yourself in such a difficult situation. Spielberg, in contrast, only made one of the easiest choices there is.”
A very realist point of view, isn’t it?
And looking at another post on Global Voices, Bob Chen translated some responses and comments from Chinese netizens, the majority view echoes that of Hecaitou: in a cruel world, national interests is of the first importance. while we feel for the suffering of people in darfur, but who are Americans to give us moral judgment and lessons? As this comment summarized the view:”there is no absolute right or wrong. What really hide behind the subtle and intricate international relations are just the interests of different countries.”
All of this leads me to wonder, is there really no room for realism and liberalism to “live” together in international relations? Does it have to be either this or that, but not both of them?
