China steps up mediator role and peace builder in the world

Published: July 25,2024

By Staff writer 

Foreign Minister Wang Yi (center) poses for a group photo on Tuesday at the Diaoyutai State Guesthouse in Beijing with members of Palestinian factions, who signed a declaration on ending division and strengthening Palestinian unity. ZHAI JIANLAN/XINHUA

Since October last year, the war between Israel and Palestine has claimed thousands of lives and there is no hope that this war is going to stop any time soon. IT was a historical moment when 14 Palestinian factions met in Beijing and held a three-day dialogue aimed at reconciling with each other to end divisions and work together. The Chinese Foreign Minister Yang Yi who presided over the reconciliation dialogue said that the factions reached an agreement and signed a declaration on ending divisions and strengthening unity.

The reconciled factions agreed to form an interim national reconciliation government that will take charge of the governance of Gaza after the war and work towards establishing an independent Palestine State. Beijing has of recent transformed into a peacetalks capital to end global conflict. In March last year, China brokered a reconciliation deal between Iran and Saudi Arabia, after years of severing diplomatic ties. Following the peace talks, Saudi Arabia’s embassy in Tehran and Iranian embassy in Riyadh was reopened after seven years without diplomatic ties between the two countries. China pledged to “continue to support countries in the Middle East in exploring a development path that suits their own national conditions, strengthening communication and dialogue, adhering to unity and self-improvement, and realisinggood-neighborliness and friendship”; the Chinese Foreign minister was quoted by media.

As western countries came together through NATO to take sides on the war between Russia and Ukraine, China chose the path diplomacy and political agreement. China is the only country that came up with peace paper proposal on the settlement of the Ukraine crisis. China issued a position paper titled “China’s Position on the Political Settlement of the Ukraine Crisis,” systematically elaborating on China’s stance in 12 points. China’s position paper is a reflection of its sincere and genuine commitment to promoting peace talks and finding a rational and peaceful solution to the crisis. Chinese President Xi Jinping has been advocating a peaceful and rationale deal since the outbreak of the Ukraine crisis. XI insists that a long-term war of attrition is not a sustainable solution for anyone. The peace paper provides ideas that can be applied universally to all the hotspots across the globe, and how to prevent humanitarian tragedies from happening and achieve lasting peace and universal security.

When president Xi Jinping proposed the Global Security Initiative (GSI), the purpose was to promote world peace by eliminating the root causes of international conflict and promote durable peace and development in the world. If all countries emulated China in persuing peace rather than conflict, in supporting dialogue rather than war to solve the prevailing global conflicts, then the world would be a better place for the current and future generations  because without peace there can be no development.