60 China The EconomistDecember 7th 2019
2 When votes are taken on matters China re-
gards as important, its diplomats often use
a blunt transactional approach—offering
financing for projects, or threatening to
turn off the tap. This buys China clout, if
not affection, other diplomats say.
Mr Xi’s influence is evident. Much of the
language that Chinese officials try to insert
into undocuments uses his catchphrases,
such as “win-win co-operation” and “a
community with a shared future for man-
kind” (keep your hands off China, is the un-
derlying sentiment). For three years in a
row, Chinese diplomats managed to inject
favourable references to Mr Xi’s Belt and
Road Initiative (bri), a “win-win” global in-
frastructure-building scheme, into resolu-
tions on Afghanistan. They have persuaded
senior unofficials, including the secre-
tary-general, António Gutteres, to praise
the briin speeches as a model for global
development. In 2018 China convinced the
unHuman Rights Council in Geneva (from
which America withdrew later that year) to
endorse its preferred approach of “promot-
ing mutually beneficial co-operation” in
this field, ie, refraining from criticism.
More than merely language is involved.
In 2017 China sought successfully to cut
funding for a job intended to ensure that all
of the un’s agencies and programmes pro-
mote human rights. That same year Wu
Hongbo, a Chinese diplomat who was then
in charge of the unDepartment of Eco-
nomic and Social Affairs, expelled Dolkun
Isa, a Uighur activist, from a unforum to
which Mr Isa was an invited delegate, rep-
resenting a German ngo(Mr Isa was even-
tually let back in after protests from Ameri-
can and German diplomats). Mr Wu, whose
post required him to be non-partisan, later
boasted about his actions on Chinese state
television. “We have to strongly defend the
motherland’s interests,” he said.
Opposition to China’s more assertive
approach may grow. “I think they are over-
doing it and I think at some stage people
will start to resist,” says the Security Coun-
cil diplomat. But some others at the undo
not share that view. Smaller states in Africa
and the Middle East, many of them dicta-
torships, resent America’s post-cold-war
dominance of the un. Why should China
not push back, asks a diplomat from one
country in that part of the world. The envoy
says that countries may be subjected to
pressure from China when it wants some-
thing, but that America, albeit not as blunt,
can also be transactional. Some smaller
countries may welcome having two great
powers competing for their favour again.
“There’s a degree of hypocrisy about it,”
says Richard Gowan of the International
Crisis Group, a conflict-prevention ngo. “It
would be weird to imagine that China as a
rising power wouldn’t want a bigger stake
in the multilateral system.” Few would
imagine that now. 7E
very yearan elderly retiree brings doz-
ens of his friends to a wind-swept cus-
toms post at Mishan on China’s side of the
country’s border with Russia. “There is
nothing to see or do here,” says the man,
who goes by the name “Old Jiang”. He is not
entirely right. Not far away, the border runs
through a large, picturesque lake. A dis-
used bridge is described as the world’s
smallest connecting two countries. And
busloads of visitors arrive every day, many
drawn by memories of a not-so-distant his-
tory and curiosity about “the very exis-
tence” of the post, as Mr Jiang puts it.
Such a symbol of normal interaction
once could not have existed. In 1969 Jixi
prefecture, to which Mishan belongs, was
the scene of border skirmishes between
China and the Soviet Union that many ob-
servers feared could escalate into war. The
little bridge was built three years later to fa-
cilitate talks, but it was not until the late
1980s that the two countries made peace. In
1991 the Soviet Union agreed to let China
keep the river island known in Russian as
Damansky and in Chinese as Zhenbao, over
which the clashes began. Today China and
Russia describe each other as best friends.
In recent years sites that recall those
nail-biting days of Sino-Soviet hostility
have become tourist attractions. Zhenbao
is under military administration, so tour-
ists are sometimes barred from the island
itself (foreigners all the more so). But Chi-
nese visitors can pay to be whizzed aroundit on motorboats. “Fifty years ago, Zhenbao
island was a global centre of attention,”
says an elderly tourist from the southern
city of Guangzhou. He says he wanted to
visit because the fighting in 1969 was “Chi-
na’s first victory over the Soviet Union”.
China’s leader, Xi Jinping, and his Rus-
sian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, say
growing tourism between the two coun-
tries is helping to strengthen their ties. In
2018 China received 2.2m Russian tourists
while 1.7m Chinese went the other way. But
these numbers are small compared with
China’s total inbound and outbound flows,
and contribute little to visitor statistics at
China’s official tourist sites along the bor-
der. Chinese firms and local governments
have been pouring money into developing
such tourist spots, but the main targets are
domestic travellers. There are plenty of
Russian visitors to China’s border towns.
But they do not head to the main sightsee-
ing attractions. They usually come carrying
large bags, to shop for cheap goods.
Farther north along the Ussuri river, at
its confluence with the Amur, lies Heixiazi,
or Bolshoy Ussuriysky in Russian, a 350-
square-kilometre island which the two
countries agreed to divide between them in
2004 (marker posts are pictured). On its
side, China built a nature reserve that at-
tracts around 600,000 tourists a year, al-
most all Chinese. Also on the Chinese half
is an abandoned tin-roofed Russian mili-
tary post, preserved to demonstrate that
China managed to prise back some of its
territory. Plans by Russian and Chinese
firms to develop the Russian side for tou-
rism have failed to come together. In 2012
China completed a 1.6km road bridge link-
ing its part of the island with the Chinese
shore. For now, Russians can only reach
their side by ferry. In reaping the dividends
of peace, China faces little competition
from its one-time adversary.^7MISHAN
Along the China-Russia border,
tourists flock to reminisceBorderland tourismTense times
recalled
Next year’s summer holiday, anyone?