Juan Pablo Domínguez

外交学院。 北京， 中国
2007 年，9 月，5 日

Becoming the “enemy”

China’s Role in the Peacekeeping Operations of the United Nations

I. Introduction
China’s growth in terms of economics and international openness has set upon new
issues for defining its role in the international system. Its increasing political and military
strength has set up beacons in the major capitals and international organizations. Chinese
rise has imposed new responsibilities to Beijing and the way it will embrace such tasks
are still a matter of debate between governments and academics.

Here we will concentrate on the role it has taken in the last 20 years regarding United
Nations Peacekeeping Operations. Furthermore, the purpose of this paper is to assess how
China has shifted its perception of UNPKO and, in this issue in particular, accepted its
role of World responsible power. It is in this way that we have divided this short paper
into five main sections being this introduction the first one. The second section is to
address the methodological aspect of the inquiry. Following we present a brief recount of
the historical background supporting Chinese perception of UNPKOs, focusing on the
Korean War and the Kuwait War. The fourth section analyses recent PKOs where China
has actively participated. Finally the last section is composed by a set of concluding
remarks.

II. Methodology
How can we grasp its intentions and perception of UNPKOs? In combination with its
explanation of vote, China’s voting behavior on UNPKO can indicate its support for the
UN peacekeeping regime as a whole. The same is true for Beijing’s contribution of
Chinese peacekeepers. Whether or not they are sent to a specific mission is solely
decided in the Chinese capital. While timing, mission requirements, and peacekeeping
capabilities play a crucial role in determining the ultimate force level provided by the
contributing country, it is always the country itself that has the final say on how many of
its peacekeepers will actually serve in the mission in question. Thus, the number of
Chinese peacekeepers contributed to specific missions does indicate China’s commitment
to the UN peacekeeping regime itself.

These two indicators can only describe how, but cannot explain why, China’s
participation has changed. In fact, the motives at the leadership level in Beijing are
difficult to identify due to the lack of constant and cross-time access to decision-makers
in the Chinese bureaucracy. Exploring China’s motives for its participation in UNPKO
will therefore remain largely speculative and evidence anecdotal at best. This study will
not address this issue, but future research is needed.

III. From Korea to Kuwait

The first significant contact of the new China with the United Nations forces was
merely 9 months after its foundation and it was probably the worst beginning it could
ever have. Chinese Volunteers engaged the US led UN forces in North Korea in what
became the first military battle of the Cold War and aided its Communist Comrades in an
effort to respond to its security interests and as a way to oppose US actions in preventing
the liberation of Taiwan. As an obvious result, China’s attitude towards the United
Nations and its Peacekeeping Operations was significantly impacted. As a consequence
of this traumatic experience, Beijing regarded all subsequent UN interventions as being
manipulated by the superpowers.

During the Gulf crisis of 1990-1991, China abstained in the vote on resolution 678
which authorized the use of force against Iraq (Staehle, 2006). Though, as stated before,
it consistently opposed the military measures, China did not claim that its abstention
carried a constitutional significance. Major-General Du Kuanyi, the head of the
Delegation of the People’s Republic of China to the United Nations Military Staff
Committee, attempted to provide an explanation for China’s abstention. In his words

I believe you are al aware that China abstained in the vote on Resolution 678. The reason for our
abstention is that the resolution runs counter to China’s consistent principled position of settling
international disputes by peaceful means. Nevertheless, it needs to be emphasized that although
China did not vote in favour of that resolution as far as the Gulf is concerned, China and other
members of the international community, including the United States, shared a common purpose,
that is, to bring the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait to an early end. It was for this reason that we did not
use our right of veto to prevent the adoption of this resolution.1

Following the Gulf crisis, China has abstained during the vote on resolutions related
to the employment of enforcement measures under Chapter VII2. It did so in relation to
Libya (1992), Rwanda (1993), Haiti (1994) and Sudan (1996). According to scholars,
such behavior of abstaining despite announcing publicly its support might be explained
between the gains and losses of side-payments. In other words, China by supporting or
not interfering might win less pressure on human rights allegations and increase
preferential trade arrangements, and also because there appears to be a correlation
between good relations with leading States and economic growth. On November the 12th
of 1997, China voted in favor of a resolution adopted by the Council under Chapter VII
imposing restrictions on the travel of Iraqi officials. At this meeting the representative of
China stressed that his government opposed the use of force and explained that China’s
‘affirmative’ vote on this matter did not imply any change in his government’s position
on the question of sanctions.

1
An address by General Kuanyi to the seminar of the Canadian Institute of Strategic Studies in Ontario,
May 1991. Du Kuanyi (1991), “A Chinese View of the Role of the United Nationsl in International
Security”, in A. Morrison (ed.), Peacekeeping, Peacemaking or War: International Security Enforcement,
The Canadian Institute of Strategic Studies, Ontario, p. 73.
2
This Chapter of the United Nations Charter refers to the actions with respect to the peace, breaches of the
peace, and acts of aggression. PKOs lie therefore within the jurisdiction of such articles.
 IV. Recent developments of China and UNPKOs
For the reasons we explained in section III, when New China joined the United
Nations in 1971 it refused to fund UN peacekeeping operations for over a decade and
remained wary of engaging in council discussions on the topic. After the Cold War,
Beijing decided to send small contingents of military engineers and observers to serve in
UN missions in Cambodia and Kuwait. But it would be another decade before China
began to expand significantly its participation in UN missions.

Chinese initial support for UN military deployment came at the hand of its
African allies. China by 2006 was the 13th-largest contributor of UN peacekeepers,
providing 1,648 troops, police and military observers to 10 nations, mostly in African
countries, including Congo, Liberia and southern Sudan. But its activities reach well
beyond Africa, Chinese riot police have been sent to Haiti to quell unrest.

Wang Guangya, China's UN ambassador, said that China is filling a vacuum left
by the West. "The major powers are withdrawing from the peacekeeping role," he said.
"That role is being played more by small countries. China felt it is the right time for us to
fill this vacuum. We want to play our role." (Xinhuanet, 2005)

China played a critical role in persuading the Sudanese government to allow an

expanded UN presence in the Darfur region (Lynch, 2006). During a UN Security
Council mission to the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa, in June of 2005, it was the
Chinese Delegation who acted upon for the situation in Somalia and urged the Council to
support the deployment of peacekeepers. It marked a turning point for Beijing, the first
time it had taken the lead in the 15-nation council in promoting foreign intervention to
resolve a conflict thousands of miles from its own borders.

V. Conclusions
During the 1990s, China frequently expressed its uneasiness about UN
peacekeeping mandates, especially if they authorized the use of force or interfered in the
domestic affairs of sovereign states. Obviously, China had shown little support for the
UN peacekeeping regime throughout the 1990s given its personal history against UN
forces in the Korean War. But now it seems as if a new trend in Chinese peacekeeping is
emerging. In recent years, Beijing began to deploy more Chinese peacekeepers abroad
than ever before despite the fact that the mandates of these UNPKO authorized the use of
force and interfered in the internal affairs of the host country. A change in its perception
in world affairs has happened; China has taken a new role. It has become what in the 50’s
it would call a form of imperialism: it has become the “enemy”.
 Reference
Lynch, Colum (2006) “China Filling Void Left by West in U.N. Peacekeeping”;
Washington Post Staff Writer, Washington.
Osman, Mohamed A. (2002) “The United Nations and Peace Enforcement” London
School of Economics and Political Science, London.
Staehle, Stefan (2006) “China’s Participation in The United Nations Peacekeeping
Regime” George Washington University, Washington.
“China takes active part in UN peacekeeping operations” 2005, Xinhuanet.