{"id":937,"date":"2026-03-03T16:46:21","date_gmt":"2026-03-03T16:46:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/937\/"},"modified":"2026-03-03T16:46:21","modified_gmt":"2026-03-03T16:46:21","slug":"what-to-know-about-china-and-the-iran-war","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/937\/","title":{"rendered":"What to know about China and the Iran war"},"content":{"rendered":"

BEIJING (AP) \u2014 The day the U.S. and Israel attacked Iran<\/a>, China waited several hours before taking its first official position. It said it was \u201chighly concerned\u201d and called for an immediate halt to military operations and the resumption of dialogue.<\/p>\n

The next day, Foreign Minister Wang Yi condemned the strikes as unacceptable and again called for more talks.<\/p>\n

There were no indications of direct intervention \u2014 but such an expectation wouldn\u2019t be realistic. As in other recent conflicts, including last year\u2019s attack<\/a> on Iran, China has condemned the use of force while remaining on the sidelines, keeping in mind its long-term interests. <\/p>\n

This time, those interests include a highly anticipated visit by U.S. President Donald Trump to Beijing, expected to take place around early April.<\/p>\n

Why China is staying out of the fight<\/p>\n

China\u2019s military has grown rapidly. It has conducted military drills<\/a> with Iran and established a base in Djibouti in East Africa in 2017. But its overwhelming focus is defending its interests in Asia, from Taiwan to the South China Sea.<\/p>\n

It has waded into Middle East diplomacy where it sees an opportunity, helping to broker a rapprochement<\/a> between Iran and Saudi Arabia in 2023. But it views the U.S. wars in Afghanistan and Iraq as cautionary tales to be avoided, said William Yang, an analyst with the International Crisis Group.<\/p>\n

\u201cChina is reluctant to project military power beyond its immediate periphery and it is also unwilling to play the role of security guarantor in unstable regions like the Middle East,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Likewise, it has provided diplomatic and economic support to Russia<\/a> and Venezuela, but steered away from any military action in Ukraine<\/a> or Latin America.<\/p>\n

China\u2019s position on the sidelines shows the limits to its influence in global geopolitics, said Craig Singleton, a senior China fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, a Washington-based research institute.<\/p>\n

\u201cBeijing\u2019s response has been predictably restrained, underscoring China\u2019s limited ability to shape events once hard power is in motion,\u201d he said. \u201cBeijing can signal unease; however, it cannot meaningfully deter or influence U.S.-Israeli military action.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ties with U.S. outweigh those with Iran<\/p>\n

China\u2019s unhappiness with the strikes against Iran is unlikely to upend ties with the U.S.<\/a> or plans for Trump to meet Chinese leader Xi Jinping in Beijing in about a month, analysts say.<\/p>\n

For Chinese leaders, the relationship with the U.S. is much more crucial than with Iran on multiple fronts, from trade and the economy to Taiwan.<\/p>\n

Beijing may have a war of words with Washington over Iran, but the downside to creating a new conflict with Trump outweighs the upside, said George Chen, a partner at The Asia Group.<\/p>\n

\u201cU.S.-China relations are already complicated enough for President Trump and Xi to handle,\u201d he said. Adding Iran to the mix \u201cwon\u2019t be something that both sides are keen to do.\u201d<\/p>\n

Still, it is possible that Beijing could postpone the Trump visit, he said.<\/p>\n

Energy concerns go beyond Iran\u2019s oil<\/p>\n

China is the top importer of oil from Iran, but the government is deeply concerned with energy security and has developed alternatives. What\u2019s most worrisome is rising prices and potentially losing access to oil and natural gas from the broader Middle East.<\/p>\n

China imported about 1.4 million barrels a day \u2014 or 13% of China\u2019s total seaborne oil imports \u2014 from Iran last year, according to Kpler, a data and analytics company. But the firm estimates that enough oil is already in transit to last another four to five months. That would give China\u2019s independent refineries time to adjust and seek alternatives, with discounted Russian oil as their primary option, said Muyu Xu, a senior analyst with Kpler. <\/p>\n

China has spent years diversifying its supplies and building up its reserves, Singleton said. \u201cThe loss of Iranian oil appears marginal, not material, at least in the short-term,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Iran\u2019s attempts to shut down the Strait of Hormuz<\/a> \u2014 the narrow mouth to the Persian Gulf \u2014 is of greater concern, as are any attacks on liquefied natural gas facilities in the Gulf states.<\/p>\n

QatarEnergy, a major supplier, halted production<\/a> of liquefied natural gas Monday after its facilities were attacked.<\/p>\n

Why China may not help arm Iran<\/p>\n

China is unlikely to send arms to Iran to help it fight the U.S. for several reasons, analysts say.<\/p>\n

\u201cTangible military aid, if any, would be limited to existing long-term defense trade arrangements rather than rapid battlefield support, and it would be constrained by Beijing\u2019s interest in avoiding direct confrontation with the U.S. and its allies,\u201d said Muhammad Zulfikar Rakhmat, a researcher at the Center of Economic and Law Studies in Indonesia.<\/p>\n

China has criticized the U.S. for supplying arms to Ukraine, saying it prolongs the fighting.<\/p>\n

Iran\u2019s missile program is based on Chinese technology, said James M. Dorsey, an adjunct senior fellow at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. But he predicted that China would err on the side of caution rather than sell any missiles to the country\u2019s military. <\/p>\n

\u201cWhat China wants is this to end,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

___<\/p>\n

Associated Press writers Kanis Leung in Hong Kong, Didi Tang in Washington, E. Eduardo Castillo in Beijing and Simina Mistreanu in Taipei, Taiwan, contributed.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"BEIJING (AP) \u2014 The day the U.S. and Israel attacked Iran, China waited several hours before taking its…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":938,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[178,262,987,988,989,38,777,197,990,34,196,768,993,991,992,82,986],"class_list":{"0":"post-937","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-iran","8":"tag-asia-pacific","9":"tag-china","10":"tag-china-government","11":"tag-craig-singleton","12":"tag-diplomacy","13":"tag-donald-trump","14":"tag-energy-industry","15":"tag-general-news","16":"tag-george-chen","17":"tag-iran","18":"tag-iran-war","19":"tag-military-and-defense","20":"tag-muhammad-zulfikar-rakhmat","21":"tag-wang-yi","22":"tag-william-yang","23":"tag-world-news","24":"tag-xi-jinping"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@iran\/116166261828301482","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/937","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=937"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/937\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/938"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=937"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=937"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=937"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}