Pakistan-China Strategic Cooperation (1972- 2015)

Abstract

Pakistan’s search for security right after the independence led their policies to join western bloc in the midst of cold war due to threats posed from New Delhi and Kabul over territorial issues including Jammu & Kashmir issue, and Pak-Afghan Border. Pakistan’s foreign policy was driven by its commitment to Washington’s containment policy, which earned it hostility of communist bloc. Pakistan did not agreed to Washington’s policy of supporting New Delhi during the 1962 Sino-Indian War. This led Ayub Khan to explore other options and resulted in signing border agreement of 1963 with Beijing, which established the foundation of strategic partnership with Beijing. Islamabad played a significant role to end the Chinese isolation when it arranged the Nixon’s visit to Beijing in the early 1970s, which led to the Sino-US rapprochement. Since then, Beijing and Islamabad never looked back and have forged close association through the multilateral agreements over the years in the fields of military cooperation, nuclear cooperation as well as political and economic cooperation. The article summarizes the findings of doctoral studies by Noonari, which aims to explore the strategic cooperation between China and Pakistan and its impact over the US interests in the region.