Neither Right nor Moral
Neither Right nor Moral
Head of the CCP's International Dept in South America, a new CHEC project in Jamaica, and El Salvador closes in on AIIB membership. Plus: why China stands by Venezuela.
Welcome to Chaufa, a China-Western Hemisphere Newsletter by CPSI.
Today’s edition covers August 5 to August 18.
Listen on Spotify or read the full edition below:
The Top 5 Stories:
The head of the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) International Department (the party equivalent to the PRC’s foreign ministry) Liu Jianchao traveled across South America for a few key meetings:
He headlined in the UN’s Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean’s (ECLAC’s) seminar with the Chinese embassy in Chile on “the importance of the strategic and historical relationship between the region and China”.
A discussion with the President of the Chilean Chamber of Deputies where they talked about trade, diplomacy, and addressing global challenges.
A conversation with Uruguayan President Lacalle Pou on improving political trust, deepening economic integration, and improving cooperation with Mercosur. Lacalle Pou also raised Venezuela’s political crisis with Liu.
For the first time since 2018, Mercosur and Chinese foreign ministry officials gathered for the China-Mercosur Dialogue. This year’s dialogue, which was the seventh meeting in this format, was hosted by Uruguay’s Under Secretary of Foreign Affairs Nicolás Albertoni and Chinese Vice Foreign Minister Hua Chunying. The meeting resulted in an agreement to hold another dialogue next year and for China to produce a “roadmap” for future Sino-Mercosur ties.
President Lacalle Pou made improving Mercosur’s relationship with China a major priority for Uruguay’s Mercosur presidency. This includes attempting to restart FTA negotiations.
Notably, Paraguay participated in this year’s dialogue despite lacking formal ties with the PRC.
Chile’s largest steel mill, the CAP-owned Huachipato mill in the central Bio Bio region, announced it would shutter by September due to a flood of cheap Chinese steel imports.
The Chilean government had previously imposed an 34% anti-dumping tariff on Chinese steel to try to protect the facility.
The closure comes as companies and governments around the world are increasingly concerned about Chinese manufacturing overcapacity, especially in the steel and aluminum sectors.
El Salvador’s legislature approved the country’s accession to the Chinese-led Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB). The country had originally signed an agreement to join the bank back in 2023.
Based in Beijing, the AIIB was set up in 2016 as part of China’s ever-expanding Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). El Salvador swiftly joined the BRI in 2019 after it broke relations with Taipei.
The China Harbour Engineering Company (CHEC) broke ground on a $26.9 million urban center in Boundbrook, Jamaica that will house government offices and private entities.
China Harbour has long had a notable presence in Jamaica. The company first opened its regional hub on the island around 2013, and it has built a wide-array of projects from the North-South Highway to residences at Mammee Bay.
Core Brief
Why China continues to stand by the Maduro Regime
Much of Latin America and the Caribbean, as well as the G7 and European Union, has refused to recognize Maduro’s fraudulent election results in Venezuela. But as many have noted, China (and its authoritarian friends like Russia and Iran) have gone to great lengths to support the Maduro regime. If somehow the opposition comes to power, this begs the question of why China is risking its reputation on a somewhat still-unclear outcome in the country.
As others have covered, much of the PRC’s support owes to the longstanding economic and political ties between the two countries. Regarding the former, in 2023, China purchased nearly two-thirds of Venezuela’s oil. Additionally, the two nations have signed a plethora of commercial, technological, and political agreements after Maduro’s 2023 trip to Beijing. On the latter, political ties are further buttressed by the ideological affinity between two ruling leftist parties.1
But close economic and political ties are far from the only reasons that China stands by the Maduro regime despite its flagrant disregard for democratic norms.2
As the vanguard of an authoritarian regime, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) was never going to stand up for democracy or the rule of law in Venezuela. As seen from Tiananmen Square massacre to the repression of the Hong Kong protest movement, the CCP fears losing its grip on power due to popular discontent. Thus, it has never been in the CCP’s interests to be agnostic (let alone endorse) a popular movement to overthrow an authoritarian leader.
Though the CCP doesn’t generally resort to ballot stuffing (the party’s integration into society and the state, as well as its widespread repression, achieves its authoritarian stability), the CCP has long held that domestic politics are the reserve of that country’s government. As long as Maduro is in power, his decision to continue in government through fraud rather than democratic institutions makes no difference to a party that operates by similar methods.
That said, the operative phrase there is “in power.” If Maduro comes to a power-sharing arrangement with the opposition or he is forced to flee the country, China’s ties to Venezuela may slightly diminish but are unlikely to disappear. The PRC’s political, economic, and social interests in maintaining strong ties with Venezuela go well beyond a single government or leader. And as the example of Milei’s Argentina shows, even if a new opposition-led Venezuelan government hopes to reduce its dependence on Beijing, it will likely find it nearly impossible to do so in the near-term.
The Roundup
Politics and Security
Brazil’s and China’s presidents exchanged messages to mark the 50th anniversary of diplomatic relations, with President Xi calling the relationship one of “good friends with similar ideas.”
The newly-appointed PRC ambassador to the Bahamas Yan Jiarong was introduced to several local ministers, including the Deputy Prime Minister, Foreign Minister, Environment and Natural Resources Minister, and Agriculture Minister.
China’s Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs Hua Chunying traveled to Honduras to meet with President Castro and to sign an agreement to build 375 schools in the Central American country. The two sides also agreed to have their FTA early harvest agreement go into effect on September 1.
Buenos Aires province continues to build independent relations with the PRC, this week with an agreement on approving food exports from the Argentine province to China.
Following Venezuela’s fraudulent elections, China’s ambassador and Venezuela’s Vice President met to recommit to their close relationship and review the implementation of various economy and technology agreements. (TeleSur)
Investment, infrastructure, and finance
Three Chinese companies announced major investments in Mexico this week: MG Motors will build a manufacturing plant and R&D facility, Good Mark Industrial will invest $12 million in Torreón, and SINOBOOM started construction on a $150 million plant in Guanajuato.
The UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) joined forces with the China South-South Cooperation Network to provide $165,000 in drones, computers and training of eight drone pilots and 12 Geographic Information Systems (GIS) data analysts to the Guyana Rice Development Board (GRDB).
The CAMC Engineering-backed Punta Huete international airport reconstruction project got underwayduring an inauguration ceremony on August 15 led by Laureano Ortega Murillo (son of the Nicaraguanpresident Daniel Ortega).
A business delegation from the state-owned China Energy International Group traveled to Panama to discuss modernizing energy infrastructure, including the “expansion of generation and transmission capacities, investment in renewable energy, energy storage, hydrogen and green ammonia.”
The Chinese consortium Ecuacorriente opened a laboratory to analyze the soil and rocks from its Mirador mine in Ecuador to ensure the safety and stability of the mine.
Jinteng Mining, a Zijin Mining Group subsidiary, sought a judicial review against Canada's decision regarding a Canadian company's sale of a gold mine in Peru.
Trade and Technology
As the Chinese ambassador to Cuba met with executives from the Center for Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology and asserted that both countries “can learn from each other... in the field of science and technology,” Sino-Cuban joint venture Biotech Pharmaceuticals Limited (BPL) announced clinical trials for a new monoclonal antibody treatment in China.
Owing to the recent implementation of the Sino-Ecuadorian FTA, the number of Chinese ships arriving at the port of Guayaquil has increased by about 50%.
Taiwan
The Taiwan Foreign Trade Development Council (TAITRA) and the ROC’s trade office in Quito are hosting a major business conference in Guayaquil in late August to strengthen trade ties with Ecuador.
Paraguay’s foreign minister signed an MOU with Taiwan’s ambassador on funding an array of projects for the next five years, including those related to “security and defense, public health, social housing, education, science and technology in addition to information and communication security, visionary high-tech industries.”
Taiwan and Belize held both a virtual meeting of their economic agreement’s Technical Barriers to Trade Committee and a Sheep and Goat Parasite Management Workshop at the University of Belize Central Farm Campus.
Ambassador Ku and the Haitian Minister of the Environment Moïse Fils inaugurated two new photovoltaic (solar) pumping systems located in the Paulette and Makimara.
Taiwan’s Minister of Foreign Affairs Lin Chia-lung received Guatemalan Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs of Guatemala Julio Eduardo Orozco Pérez in Taipei to discuss commercial ties (especially agriculture) and international organizations cooperation.
The Taiwan Technical Mission (TTM) and the Caribbean Digital Transformation Project (CARDTP) offered a one-day training workshop on artificial intelligence to St. Lucian government employees.
Analysis and Opinion
Reporting from Argentina, Ryan Dubé and Silvina Frydlewsky write for the Wall Street Journal about how President Milei has found it difficult to decouple from China despite deriding previous administrations’ close ties to Beijing.
Andrew Latham writes for the Hill that “Canada’s ‘middle power’ diplomacy no longer works in China” because “in today’s world, no one — and especially not Beijing — pays any attention whatsoever to what Ottawa has to say about global and regional security issues.”
The Heritage Foundation’s Andrés Martínez-Fernández and Allison Engle argue for the National Interest that “Beijing is showing its true colors as a coercive and subversive political actor in” Costa Rica as the country has faced failed infrastructure projects and a dispute over Huawei’s 5G ban in the country.
Writing for World Politics Review, James Bosworth argues that “Maduro’s authoritarian backers,” including China, “are bleeding Venezuela dry.”
Joseph Bouchard evaluates the status of Colombia’s strategic partnership with China in The Diplomat, finding that “it is crucial for Colombia to recognize China not only as a global economic powerhouse but also as an example of resilience and success in overcoming significant challenges.”
That’s it for now, see you again in two weeks!
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This doesn’t mean that relations have always been strong between Xi and Maduro. Notably, as Venezuela faced increasing isolation abroad and at home in the late 2010s and early 2020s, the China-Venezuela relationship slowed-down significantly. Though Chaves paved the road for close ties to Beijing, the current Sino-Venezuela relationship under Maduro is a more recent phenomenon.
I don’t cover it here, and obviously it is not the main reason for Beijing’s support for Maduro, but the CCP also clearly loves the opportunity to thumb its nose at Washington in its own backyard.