‘Big gap’ exists between Washington and Beijing’s expectations on how to rein in Pyongyang’s nuclear weapons programme, Chinese analyst says
The United States’ plan to “lean hard” on China to rein in North Korea’s nuclear ambitions may yield limited results, a Chinese analyst has suggested. There is a “big gap” between what Washington expects Beijing to do to help curb Pyongyang’s nuclear weapons programme and what Beijing is actually willing to do, according to Shi Yinhong, a State Council adviser and director of the Centre for American Studies at Renmin University in Beijing. Shi was commenting on Thursday after US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said the previous day that Washington was only in the early stages of its campaign to pressure North Korea and that it would “lean hard” on China to do so as well. “ [Tillerson’s speech] was only bluffing to some extent. The Trump administration is in such a mess now I don’ t believe they have a comprehensive plan [on North Korea] , ” he said. The US campaign to pressure China to rein in North Korea had already achieved some degree of success as Beijing had toughened its response towards Pyongyang, Shi said. But he added that he was highly sceptical of how far Beijing would be willing to go along with the strategy. The US had underestimated North Korean leader Kim Jong-un’s ability to resist pressure and had also failed to provide Pyongyang a clear offer on the conditions for negotiations, the analyst said. Tillerson had on Wednesday outlined Washington’s strategy in handling the North Korean nuclear crisis. The US Secretary of State said America had a tremendous opportunity to refine its relationship with China for the next few decades and that he sensed great interest among the Chinese leadership to do so, too. Tillerson’s comments came during his first address to all State Department employees since he took office in February. In the address, he offered the most detailed outline of the Trump administration’s foreign policy priorities he had given so far, with North Korea among the top concerns. The Trump administration strategy – which Tillerson described as a departure from the Obama government’s approach – included preparing for more sanctions against North Korea, convincing other countries to apply existing UN sanctions more rigorously, as well as “leaning in hard” on Beijing and to “test” its commitment to reining in its wayward ally. Tillerson said the Trump administration had so far only covered about 20 to 25 per cent of its strategy to put pressure on Pyongyang and that it was prepared to assert even stronger force on the reclusive regime. “So it’s a pressure campaign that has a knob on it. I’ d say we’ re at about dial setting five or six right now, ” he said. He warned that Washington might take action against Chinese banks or companies that deal with North Korea if Beijing failed to enforce existing UN sanctions. US-China relations were at a “point of inflection” and ripe for review, he said. “Let’s kind of revisit this relationship and what it is going to be over the next half century, ” Tillerson said. “I think it’s a tremendous opportunity we have to define that and there seems to be a great interest on the part of the Chinese leadership to do that as well.” Beijing has previously said the two countries should work towards a “new type of relations between great powers”, but the idea received a lukewarm reaction from the Obama administration. In a separate development, Chinese Vice-Premier Wang Yang discussed China-US economic ties on the phone with US Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin and Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross on Wednesday. The three “exchanged ideas on enhancing comprehensive economic cooperation between the two countries” the state-run news agency Xinhua reported late on Wednesday, but without giving further details. Washington is to host the first round of the US-China Diplomatic and Security Dialogue in June. Tillerson and US Defence Secretary Jim Mattis will chair the talks with their Chinese counterparts. The discussions on economics and trade will be led by Mnuchin and Ross, according to Xinhua.
