(TNND) — A month out from a planned meeting in Beijing between President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping, relations between the two powerful countries appear to be fraying from the Iran war and the snarling of the Strait of Hormuz.
Xi denounced “the world’s retrogression to the law of the jungle” during comments Tuesday in a meeting with Spain’s prime minister.
“He didn’t explicitly refer to the U.S. or Donald Trump, but by implication, yes, he is referring to that,” said Steven Lewis, the senior China fellow at the Baker Institute for Public Policy at Rice University. “Unintentionally, he’s also critiquing Iran, in the sense that they don’t like the fact that Iran shut down the strait, either.”
China buys Iranian oil, but it also buys oil, natural gas and fertilizer from other Persian Gulf countries like Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Iraq. China also sells a lot in the region, Lewis said.
And all of that has been thrown into upheaval for China.
China has been fairly restrained in its criticism of the war, Lewis said.
But it’s clear that the war has “just complicated everything” between the U.S. and China, he said.
Trump is slated to meet with Xi in mid-May, but Lewis said the meeting is likely to get postponed a second time.
“I think the main issue is just the unpredictability of the U.S. side,” he said.
China has a relationship with Iran, but Lewis said it’s one of economic opportunity rather than ideological alliance.
China sees Iran mainly as a source of discounted oil.
But China also cares about stability in the Middle East in support of its economic interests, and Lewis said China likely thinks maintaining a relationship with Iran supports that objective.
The U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission said China is Iran’s largest trading partner and the primary buyer of Iranian oil. China buys about 90% of Iran’s exported oil, according to the commission.
Iran depends on China for energy export revenue and diplomatic backing, while China maintains a cautious approach to Iran to avoid jeopardizing relations with other Middle Eastern partners, the commission said.
Recent reports, citing U.S. intelligence, indicatedChina was preparing to send air defense systems to Iran. But the commission said China has limited its official support for Iran since the war began.
Lewis said China is more likely to share military intelligence with Iran than military hardware. He said China does not want Iran to become a nuclear power, nor does it want Iran to arm terrorist groups that could make trouble in the region.
Trump said Wednesday on social media that China agreed not to send weapons to Iran, while saying China should be happy about his efforts to open the Strait of Hormuz during the fragile ceasefire with Iran. The U.S. military is currently running a blockade on ships entering and departing Iranian ports, patrolling maritime traffic in the Gulf of Oman beyond the Strait of Hormuz.
“President Xi will give me a big, fat, hug when I get there in a few weeks,” Trump said in the post. “We are working together smartly, and very well!”
Lewis said China can weather disruptions to Middle East oil exports, as it has built up a strategic petroleum reserve.
Lewis said China likely “did not expect that the U.S. would act so unilaterally,” though it wasn’t caught completely off guard by what happened in Iran.
And China is likely also surprised by Iranian attacks on natural gas facilities in Qatar.
China wants business as usual to return to the Middle East.
And Lewis said both the U.S. and China would like a resumption of normal trade that could benefit both sides.
“China still has a lot of things it would want to get from us, including technology, and they definitely would love to sell a lot more to us,” he said.
But both sides are wary of the other, Lewis said.
And U.S.-China relations have grown more tense since the war in Iran began, he said.
