China’s "peace plan" for Ukraine isn’t about peace Analysis by Foreign Policy

The Foreign Policy magazine has published an article claiming that Beijing’s diplomatic overture has three ulterior motives in involving the Ukrainian peace process. Caliber.Az reprints the article.

China’s peace proposal for Ukraine has come to nothing—if, that is, peace in Ukraine was actually Beijing’s main motivation. The 12 points outlined in “China’s Position on the Political Settlement of the Ukraine Crisis” are clearly too abstract to be a road map to end the war. Instead, the Chinese initiative should be viewed as a piece in China’s intensified informational and diplomatic rivalry with the United States. After running its diplomatic activity at reduced speed for almost three years due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Beijing has recently launched a number of foreign-policy initiatives. The most prominent of these is the so-called peace proposal on Ukraine, with which China aims to strengthen its position vis-à-vis the United States among three specific audiences: the global south, Europe, and postwar Ukraine.

First, China aims to present itself to the global south as a future peace broker. The very same week that Beijing presented the Ukraine proposal, it also issued a concept paper outlining China’s Global Security Initiative (GSI). This was no coincidence. First announced in April 2022, the GSI is Chinese President Xi Jinping’s master plan for a new global security architecture, which envisions an enhanced role for China in safeguarding world peace—especially in the global south—through dialogue, development, and negotiation. Beijing knows that a number of countries in the global south interpret the Russo-Ukrainian war differently from the West and are more inclined to take Russia’s side and call for an early, negotiated end to the war.

Beijing has long emphasized a close relationship with the global south. Under Chinese leader Mao Zedong in the 1960s and 1970s, China strongly identified with various independence and liberation movements in Asia, Africa, and Latin America. It was with the support of a growing number of decolonized nations that China in 1971 replaced Taiwan in the United Nations and, most importantly, the UN Security Council. Today, in the context of US-Chinese rivalry, the global south is arguably more important to Beijing than ever before. It is China’s largest source of many natural resources, a vital voting base for Beijing’s influence in multilateral institutions, and the potential site of military bases if China one day wants to leapfrog the geopolitical constraints of its home region and deploy military power beyond Asia. Conflict resolution is one contribution that Beijing may offer in return, together with investments and development. Even if the Ukraine proposal was dead in the water from the start, it was an important signal of how Beijing sees its future role.

Peace has been a central theme in official Chinese rhetoric ever since the founding of the People’s Republic. In 1954, in the context of the global decolonization movement, China established the “Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence” as a guideline for its foreign policy. In 2005, Beijing issued a white paper titled “China’s Peaceful Development Road,” framing its own economic rise in the context of world peace and development. Occasionally, Chinese leaders even portray Chinese culture as more peace-loving than others, claiming that China has never started a conflict or war. Needless to say, these are unfounded statements. Not only has Chinese history been just as violent as Europe’s or any other region’s, but there is also nothing in Chinese strategic culture that would indicate that China is more or less peaceful than other nations. That said, China has not been at war since it invaded Vietnam in 1979, and China is indeed engaged in peacemaking.

Since 1990, China has dispatched more than 50,000 peacekeepers to nearly 30 UN peacekeeping missions. The two largest undertakings are Beijing’s anti-piracy task force in the Gulf of Aden and the deployment of an infantry battalion with the United Nations in South Sudan in 2015. In 2019, UN Secretary-General António Guterres appointed a Chinese diplomat as his special envoy for Africa’s Great Lakes region; Chinese diplomats have also participated in the Oslo Forum, the preeminent annual retreat on conflict mediation. And only a few weeks after China presented its proposal on Ukraine, China announced its role in brokering the deal to resurrect diplomatic ties between Iran and Saudi Arabia.

With the exception of the Ukraine plan, these Chinese efforts may indeed contribute to peace. But with the return of a great-power rivalry in world politics, the United States and China will increasingly view each other’s policies through a zero-sum lens—including their peacemaking endeavors.

Second, China’s Ukraine proposal is part of Beijing’s attempt to reset its relationship with Europe. In February, China’s top diplomat, Wang Yi, visited France, Italy, and Hungary, as well as the Munich Security Conference in Germany, where he announced China’s peace proposition on Ukraine. In Munich, Wang appealed specifically to the European leaders gathered at the conference, stating that if China and Europe chose dialogue and cooperation, Cold War-style bloc confrontation in world politics will not emerge. Beijing reckons that Washington’s shift in China policy, from engagement toward economic decoupling and security rivalry, is a lasting change. However, Beijing believes that Europe is still in play and knows that Russia, not China, is Europe’s top security challenge. Beijing understands that there is no prospect of Europe staying completely neutral between the United States and China. Yet, as pointed out by Oxford University historian Rana Mitter, China will continue reminding European nations that “simply following the US line is not the only option.” Given China’s evident loss of the United States, it wants at least to secure its economic relationship with Europe and ensure it can continue cooperating with Europe on various global issues.

Sure, Europe’s perception of China has changed dramatically during the last few years as European policymakers and companies increasingly adopt a more competitive outlook on China—even in security terms. In 2019, the European Union published a strategy paper in which it labeled China a systemic rival, and in 2021, Brussels decided to put the EU-China investment agreement on ice. Furthermore, European policymakers have taken steps to implement a number of new defensive instruments, including investment screening, trade enforcement, and procurement reciprocity. In addition, NATO’s Strategic Concept in 2022 identified China as a potential security challenge for Europe. On top of this, Beijing’s continued support of Moscow’s war in Ukraine has further harmed China’s relationship with Europe.

Nevertheless, despite these setbacks, Beijing finds that Europe is sending mixed signals. European leaders and policymakers talk about competition and rivalry with China, but they also signal strong intentions to continue cooperating with China. When German Chancellor Olaf Scholz visited China in November 2022 with a heavyweight business delegation, he told then-Chinese Premier Li Keqiang that the two countries were no friends of decoupling. At this year’s World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, French Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire went even further, declaring that “China cannot be out, China must be in.” He argued that the United States and Europe had different views on how to manage China. Moreover, both Scholz and French President Emmanuel Macron have said they are opposed to a bipolar world, indicating that they foresee an autonomous role for Europe in international affairs. China welcomes French ideas of European strategic autonomy, a message Chinese leaders and diplomats often convey to their European counterparts. Beijing is likely to reiterate this message to Macron and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen during their joint visit to China this week.

European leaders should be encouraged to continue talking with Beijing, including about Russia’s war in Ukraine. However, they need to have a realistic understanding of what, if anything, Xi is able and willing to do to make Russian President Vladimir Putin stop the war. Some European governments may believe that Beijing can be wooed away from Moscow, but that is not a likely scenario.

Third, China’s peace proposal is part of Beijing’s effort to position itself in the reconstruction of postwar Ukraine. In fact, China’s position paper on Ukraine explicitly states that it stands ready to provide assistance and play a role in post-conflict reconstruction. No other country is possibly better equipped than China to assist in rebuilding Ukraine. It has constructed more railways, highways, airports, bridges, pipelines, ports, and high-rise buildings at home and abroad than any other nation over the last two to three decades, giving Chinese companies a unique set of experiences. In addition, China has money. Welcoming Chinese assistance, expertise, and investments must be a tempting proposition for Ukraine. Seen from Beijing, contributing to the reconstruction of Ukraine would strengthen China’s overall engagement with Europe.

Kyiv’s growing links with the EU, NATO, and Washington, however, present Beijing with a complicating factor. Ahead of the EU-Ukraine summit in Kyiv in February this year, Ukrainian Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal launched a two-year timetable for securing EU membership. Although this is overly ambitious, Ukraine is planning to closely align with a Europe that is increasingly apprehensive about China’s growing might. Many European countries are particularly concerned about Chinese investments in critical infrastructure, and the EU is determined to play a major role in Ukraine’s reconstruction and recovery process in order to ensure that it goes hand in hand with reforms preparing Ukraine for membership. Moreover, if Ukraine is no longer willing to be a buffer state between NATO and Russia, Kyiv’s only real alternative is to seek some sort of security guarantee from NATO and/or the United States, which could distance Ukraine further from China. Nevertheless, Europe has not closed its door entirely on China. In addition, absent formal NATO membership, which would be difficult for Ukraine to obtain as long as the war with Russia lingers on, Chinese investments could actually be an alternative form of guarantee against Russian aggression. Given Moscow’s growing dependence on China, Russian military attacks affecting large Chinese-invested infrastructure projects in Ukraine would become highly improbable.

In the end, however, China has only limited ability to bring a peaceful solution to the Russo-Ukrainian war. The peace plan Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky presented to the G-20 summit in Bali last November calls for the full restoration of Ukraine’s territorial integrity and a complete withdrawal of Russian troops. Beijing is not likely to ask Moscow to act accordingly. This is why Washington and most European capitals are skeptical of China’s initiative. Indeed, the United States and Ukraine recently cautioned against giving any weight to alternate peace plans that seek a cease-fire without the full withdrawal of invading Russian forces.

But even though its peace initiative will do little to end the Russo-Ukrainian war, Beijing had nothing to lose by forwarding a rather vague proposal on Ukraine. On the contrary, it enables Beijing to tap into the disconnect between the West and the global south about the war. And if the proposal also helps China to improve its deteriorating relationship with Europe, including by engaging with postwar Ukraine, that would be no small achievement at all.