Tuesday May 15, 2007
By Christopher Bodeen,
Associated Press Writer
SHANGHAI, China (AP) — China’s robust oil trade and growing economic ties with Sudan will help end the violence in Darfur, a Chinese official said Tuesday, rejecting claims that financially engaging the Sudanese government is prolonging the humanitarian crisis.
China buys two-thirds of Sudan’s oil exports and is building a pipeline and supertanker installation in the African country, among other projects. The investments have upset human rights activists who say isolating the Sudanese leadership is the only way to stop militias blamed for mass killings and rapes.More than 200,000 people have been killed and 2.5 million made homeless in Darfur during four years of attacks from Arab militias allegedly sponsored by President Omar al-Bashir’s government. The attacks began after black African Sudanese demanded autonomy for the vast western Sudan region.
On Tuesday, Li Ruogu, the chairman of the state-owned China Exim Bank, which handles most of China’s overseas aid loans, said accusations against China over Darfur were “totally groundless,” and that trade and investment would reduce conflict by improving Sudanese incomes and lives.
“Chinese aid and investment will in the long run help in the resolution of the Darfur problem,” Li said at the annual meeting of the African Development Bank, being held this year in Shanghai in a sign of growing economic and political ties between China and the resource-rich continent.
Li’s China Exim Bank has approved more than $6 billion in projects for Africa, while bilateral trade has risen by about 30 percent annually in recent years, hitting $55.5 billion last year, according to the African Development Bank.
Beijing says it wants annual trade to reach $100 billion by 2020.
China’s involvement in Africa has sparked comparisons with the plundering of African resources by colonial powers in past centuries. Unlike the West, Chinese money comes without political demands, leading to accusations it is propping up oppressive regimes.
“This is an incredibly important revenue stream for the government in Sudan,” said Sophie Richardson, deputy director of the Asia division of Human Rights Watch. One concern is “that the very presence of so much money that isn’t necessarily tied to or conditioned on how the government is conducting itself in respect to human rights weakens efforts by others who do make that point.”
Even so, China recently appointed a special representative for Africa to focus on Darfur, and Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Jiang Yu said Tuesday in Beijing that China has been “playing a constructive role” in settling the Darfur conflict.
As a veto-wielding permanent member of the U.N. Security Council, Beijing has blocked efforts to send U.N. peacekeeping forces to Darfur without Sudanese consent.
Earlier Tuesday, the head of China’s central bank said Beijing will encourage Chinese companies, especially small- and medium-size firms, to invest in Africa. China has already forgiven more than $1 billion in debt to it held by African countries, and is estimated to have provided billions of dollars in aid to the continent.
Meanwhile, China’s total investment in Africa, reported by Beijing at $11.7 billion, is growing quickly as Chinese companies buy up stakes in oil and gas fields, among other assets. Fueled largely by China’s demand for raw materials, the African Development Bank forecasts economic growth for the continent as a whole will rise by 6 percent this year.
One meeting participant questioned whether African nations had a clear strategy for how to benefit best from the growing economic ties.
“China seems to have a very well defined interests in Africa,” said Peter Anyang Nyongo, a former Kenyan minister of planning and economic development. “But I’m not quite clear whether we’re as clear on our side.”
