June 14, 2024

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IntelBrief: China and Türkiye Look to Strengthen Ties Following Recent High-Level Meetings

Mikhail Metzel, Sputnik, Kremlin Pool Photo via AP

Last week, Türkiye’s Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan visited The People’s Republic of China, his first high-level visit to the country since taking office last year, with the purpose of strengthening ties, particularly diplomatically and economically. During the three-day visit, Fidan met with his Chinese counterpart Wang Yi, Vice President Han Zheng, and other prominent party officials. Ankara and Beijing have had a complicated relationship since the official beginning of their relations in 1971. Ties between the two have soured in recent years, due in part to criticisms over China’s treatment of Uighur minorities in Xinjiang, however, this trip signaled a heightened appetite for cooperation between the two countries.

Fidan’s visit provided an opportunity for Ankara to confirm its interest and make a case for its inclusion in the BRICS economic bloc, which announced plans to welcome new member states last year. Since the August announcement, Turkish officials have been evaluating the costs and benefits of joining the economic bloc. Warming relations with Beijing, one of the group’s founding members, would help set conditions for Türkiye to potentially join the group, which is expected to wield considerable economic influence in the coming decades. The possibility of Ankara’s inclusion in BRICS has been yet another source of frustration for officials in Western capitals who see the move as incongruous with Türkiye’s NATO membership and ties to the European Union (EU). Although Türkiye’s bid for EU membership has been stalled for years, it maintains a customs union agreement with Europe and is still officially a candidate for membership. Turkish officials have played down the notion that BRICS could serve as an alternative to NATO and the EU, however, it is difficult for Western capitals to ignore the implications of closer Turkish ties to BRICS members China, Russia, and Iran.

During the trip, Fidan advocated that Türkiye and China cooperate more closely to fully realize the economic potential of the bilateral relationship. Despite last year’s reversal of several unorthodox economic policies instituted by President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Türkiye’s economy remains beset by an inflation crisis. This has likely added a sense of urgency to efforts to revitalize the economic relationship with Beijing. Fidan cited investment and trade issues as key interests for Ankara during the visit. China is Türkiye’s third-largest trading partner, but the relationship is heavily lopsided toward China due to a significant trade imbalance. In 2023, Chinese goods imported by Türkiye totaled $44.9 billion, while China imported only $3.3 billion from Türkiye.

Following Fidan’s visit, there is cause for optimism that this disparity may be reduced through increased exports of Turkish agricultural and food products to the Chinese market. After having decreased in recent years, there is a growing appetite in Türkiye for Chinese investment. Fidan encouraged renewed Chinese investment, particularly in critical infrastructure projects like the Middle Corridor, which links Western Europe to the Caucasus and Central Asia. Although Ankara signed on to China’s Belt and Road Initiative in 2015, it is now seen as both an enabler and a competitor. If fully realized, the Middle Corridor would complement the Belt and Road Initiative, potentially reduce travel times between China’s western border and Europe by half, and provide a strategic alternative to the Northern Route, which transits Russia.

Following his time in Beijing, Fidan traveled to the cities of Urumqi and Kashgar in the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region, the first time such a prominent Turkish official has visited the region since President Erdogan visited in 2012. Xinjiang is home to over 11 million Uighurs, an ethnic group that consists of majority Muslim, Turkish speakers. It has been reported that the Chinese government has arbitrarily detained more than a million Muslims, the majority of them Uighurs, since 2017.

The Chinese government initially denied the existence of these camps, but later addressed the allegations by stating the camps are “vocational education centers designed to help young, unemployed people in Xinjiang learn job skills and the Chinese language.” The camps have also been described as “counter-extremism centres.” However, former detainees who have been able to reach safety and speak of their experiences in the camps have shared that those detained are required to recite Communist party slogans and songs and renounce Islam. The abuses experienced in the camps include food and sleep deprivation, stress positions, and sexual abuse; surveillance is heavy inside and outside of the camps.

As many Uighurs have attempted to escape persecution in China, Türkiye has become home to the largest Uighur diaspora outside Central Asia, with a population of nearly 50,000. Relations with China came to a head in 2019 when the Turkish Foreign Ministry released a statement condemning the Chinese government for violating “the fundamental human rights of Uighur Turks and other Muslim communities in the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region,” and calling the Chinese government’s “reintroduction of internment camps in the 21st century and the policy of systematic assimilation ... a great shame for humanity.” Additionally, Türkiye’s former Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavu?o?lu expressed at a press briefing in 2022 that ties had suffered between Ankara and Beijing because of Ankara’s “attitude on the Turkic Uighurs.”

However, Foreign Minister Fidan is seemingly trying to rekindle relations with China during his most recent visit. While in Xinjiang, Fidan visited mosques and interacted with civilians. He regarded the Uighurs as an important bridge between China and the Islamic world, stating “therefore, what we always say is this: we support China’s one-China policy, its territorial integrity and its sovereignty.” Despite Fidan referring to Urumqi and Kashgar as “Turkic-Islamic cities,” a statement unaligned with China’s policy, it appears that Ankara and Beijing have decided that it is within both of their strategic interests to revive their bilateral relations.