A Riyadh For three days, the Chinese number one promotes a “new era” in sino-Arab relations.
by Frédéric Lemaître (Beijing, correspondent)
The scene opened the Chinese television news, Thursday, December 8, at 7 p.m. We see the Boeing 747 of Air China carrying Xi Jinping, first escorted by four fighter planes in the Saudi sky then, once placed on the Tarmac in Riyadh, flying over six other jets, leaving in their wake a trail Red and yellow, the colors of the Chinese flag. At the same time, twenty -one cannon strokes then salute the arrival of the Chinese president.
Even if neither King Salman, nor the Crown Prince Mohammed Ben Salman (“MBS”) were present on the Tarmac to welcome the Chinese number, Saudi Arabia has reserved honors to which President Joe Biden had not been entitled during his visit in July. On Thursday, another video watches Xi Jinping get off from his Chinese sedan, red flag escorted by a guard of honor on horseback to the royal palace and shakes the hand of the Crown Prince at length.
Again, the contrast to the simple “fist bump” that the American president had exchanged during the summer and “MBS” is striking. This visit of the Chinese president in Saudi Arabia is described as “the most important diplomatic event and the highest level between China and the Arab world since the Foundation of the People’s Republic of China” by Mao Ning, the spokesperson for Ministry of Foreign Affairs. “A milestone will be a date,” she said. For his part, Xi Jinping speaks of a “new era in China’s relations with the Arab world, with the Arab States of the Gulf and with Saudi Arabia”. A new era in which the Arab world “looks towards the east”, as the Chinese press says, and no longer to the United States.
During this three-day trip, Xi Jinping must make a state visit to Saudi Arabia but also participate in a Chinese-Pays Arab and a second summit, bringing together China and the Gulf Cooperation Council. A dozen Arab leaders are expected in Riyadh on this occasion: those of the six Gulf States (Saudi Arabia, Oman, Kuwait, Bahrain, United Arab Emirates and Qatar) but also those of Egypt, Sudan, Iraq, from Iraq, from Iraq, Iraq, Iraq, Morocco, Lebanon and Palestine.
“A message to Washington”
It will be a question of petroleum but also of the post-pétrole and diplomacy in a region which seeks both to reduce its dependence on black gold but also to that of Washington. In recent months, Riyadh has also refused to increase his gross production as Joe Biden wished. While the latter, before his election, had described Saudi Arabia “pariah” after the assassination of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi and that since then, relations between Riyadh and the White House remain tense, Xi Jinping N ‘did not fail to recall that “China and the Arab states will continue to brandish the banner of non-interference in internal affairs [and] to support each other in the safeguard of sovereignty and territorial integrity”.
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