Executive summary:
This policy brief presents an overview of Sino-Afghan relations and assesses China's role in the wider south Asian region. It discusses how China's foreign policy principles both provide opportunities and exert constraints on China's presence in Afghanistan and beyond; it explores China's policy options in Afghanistan and evaluates Afghanistan's own preferences vis-à-vis China; it highlights China's close relations with Pakistan and how these are part of an evolving strategic landscape; and considers the indirect contribution of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation to alleviating Afghanistan's security predicament.
China's most substantive current involvement in Afghanistan is in the area of trade and economic investment. But China also has a modest security role in the training of Afghan officers and in material support. China's economic role will grow, and in the longer term it is set to become a central economic and political force in Afghanistan.
By contrast its contribution to the country's security is likely to remain modest. This reflects a variety of factors: China's emphasis on maintaining stability and cordial interstate relations across the region; its awareness of the positions of Russia and Iran towards the foreign military presence in Afghanistan; and the way its policy priorities (such as energy security) influence its strategic calculations in a complex environment.
On its own account, Afghanistan's emphasis on seeking to improve bilateral and economic links with China fits well with China's preferences. These components of the Sino-Afghan relationship suggest how western policymakers should respond to the realities of China's involvement in Afghanistan.
is a Senior Research Fellow at the Norwegian Institute of International Affairs (NUPI) and Associate Professor at the Centre for Peace Studies, University of Tromsø. She specialises in security, energy, politics and interstate relations in the Caucasus, Central Asia and South Asia. She previously worked for the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) in Kazakhstan.
Stina Torjesen holds a DPhil in international relations from the University of Oxford; her thesis assessed the prospects for regional cooperation in Central Asia in the spheres of trade, water and security. Her recent publications include (co-editor, with Elana Wilson Rowe) The Multilateral Dimension in Russian Foreign Policy, Routledge, 2008.