Updated April 8, 2026, 12:44 p.m. ET
A knot of defiant nations − three of them talked off a geopolitical cliff’s edge at the eleventh hour.
As Israel, Iran and the United States stood on the precipice of escalating a volatile war, China and Pakistan − with sharply different motives − emerged from the background as unlikely but effective mediators.
April 7 began with President Donald Trump making a widely criticized threat to destroy Iran’s “whole civilization” unless it agreed to stop a war that Israel and the United States started. It ended with Iran, Israel and the United States agreeing to a two-week pause in hostilities and the opening of a key shipping channel, the Strait of Hormuz.
Pakistan is mired in a war with Afghanistan, even as it tries to end the war on its border with Iran. China has no military footprint in the Middle East but views economic leverage against the United States, its chief global rival, as a top priority. A first round of U.S.-Iran negotiations aimed at fleshing out a 10-point peace plan is expected to take place in Islamabad on April 10.
So, how to account for Pakistan and China helping to secure a temporary, fragile peace?
It’s far from straightforward.
Pakistan and China: unlikely peace mediators?
Officials in China have for weeks been pressing Pakistan to resolve its issues first with Afghanistan before acting as a mediator in Iran. Both sides accuse each other of harboring militant groups to carry out terrorist attacks. China has also been urging Pakistan to show restraint in Afghanistan. It’s not clear if Pakistan has been heeding that call.
Joyce Karam, an analyst at Al-Monitor, a specialist news and opinion website that is focused on the Middle East, notes that China has been in no rush to end the war in Iran. “Why? Beijing is watching the United States sink deeper into the Iranian battlefield − pouring in billions, stretching troops thin and chasing a decisive victory that never comes. It’s a geopolitical windfall for China, weakening America’s grip without Beijing firing a shot.”
Still, there may be other currents at work.
Moeed Yusuf, a former national security adviser of Pakistan, said in an interview that his country and Iran are bound by longstanding ties rooted in shared culture, history and religion. Tehran was the first capital to formally acknowledge Pakistan following its creation in 1947, and Islamabad later reciprocated by supporting Iran’s new Islamic government after the 1979 revolution. The two neighbors are connected by a border stretching over 500 miles along Iran’s southeastern edge, meaning unrest in either country can easily spill over into the other. Pakistan also hosts the second-largest Shia Muslim population globally, after Iran. In addition, it serves as a diplomatic intermediary for certain Iranian interests in Washington, where Iran lacks an official embassy.
“Pakistan was uniquely placed, if somewhat coincidentally,” Yusuf said.
“It happens to be the only country at the moment that had a direct line to the U.S. president, who is the single most important actor. It’s a country that’s had the best relations with China and China was needed, as we know, to push Iran for flexibility. Pakistan was also the only country that had a very good relationship with all the Gulf countries.”
Pride may have also been a factor.
“Pakistan achieved one of its biggest diplomatic wins in years,” Michael Kugelman, a South Asia expert, said in a social media post. “It also defied many skeptics and naysayers that didn’t think it had the capacity to pull off such a complex, high-stakes feat. But what matters the most is it helped avert a potential catastrophe in Iran.”
The case for Chinese intervention
For China, the calculation to get involved in efforts to end the war and unblock the Strait of Hormuz served Chinese interests on multiple fronts, said Robert Muggah, the cofounder of Canada-based geopolitical risk and security consultancy SecDev Group and the Igarapé Institute, a Brazil-based think tank.
Muggah said the war posed a direct threat to China’s need for energy security.
China has a significant stake in stability in the Gulf and is highly exposed to the Strait of Hormuz, Muggah said. It is also deeply reliant on Iranian crude. By the end of 2025, he said, roughly 13% of China’s seaborne oil imports came from Iran, accounting for about 80% of Iran’s exported oil. He said that any prolonged disruption to shipping would raise import costs, strain economic growth and intensify pressure on an already fragile economy.
“Iran is a strategic partner. China doesn’t need Iran to win. It needs Iran to survive, remain estranged from the West, and stay commercially dependent on Beijing. A weakened but functioning Iran is still a useful partner. A collapsed Iran, or one pushed back towards accommodation with Washington, is not.”
Muggah added that Pakistan’s role was more visible and practical. In late March, Islamabad was already facilitating indirect contacts. By the time the ceasefire was announced, Pakistan had moved into the foreground. Trump publicly linked the latest “pause” to conversations with Pakistan’s Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif.
China’s role was different.
“While not the principal broker of the truce, Beijing helped create the conditions to imagine and eventually sell a ceasefire, he said. “Pakistan provided the practical channel, China provided political weight and strategic backing.”
A former senior Chinese official agreed with that assessment.
It’s in China’s interests to “see this war calm down,” said Huiyao Wang, a former senior adviser to China’s government, in a phone interview from Beijing. Wang now directs the Center for China and Globalization, a Beijing-based think tank. He said he thinks that to ensure the ceasefire holds and leads to a more permanent peace, it will ultimately be necessary for China and other major United Nations Security Council members to offer a “peace guarantee.” He said by the time Trump travels to China in May, things “will probably” be under control.
