China's expanding influence in UN

NEW DELHI: Chinas ascendancy in the UN seems almost unquestioned. A study by Gateway House has traced Chinas expanding influence in the world body, its related bodies, and influential non-UN multilateral bodies.

The research was conducted over four months in 2020-21, studying the most important multilateral agencies in the world including UN agencies, funds and programmes, as well as non-UN security, finance, and scientific agencies.

The findings revealed that China is in a dominant position in several critical multilateral bodies, in both personnel and funding.

The most prominent are the International Telecommunications Union (ITU), the UN Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO), the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), and the International Maritime Organization (IMO).

The links are obvious. ITU sets global telecommunications standards, where China's Huawei is a major player. UNIDO was formed to encourage industrialisation in the developing world but its importance has waned as countries found it unhelpful, leaving China in charge.

China immediately connected UNIDO to its Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), which UNIDO now endorses.

China's positioning at ICAO, which sets air navigation and safety standards, ensured that during the pandemic, Taiwan was excluded from all discussions, just as it was with the World Health Organization (WHO), over which China has a disproportionate influence.

In October 2020, with the world writhing under the pain of Covid-19, the UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC) held triennial elections to select 15 new members.

Despite its abysmal human rights record, and the human and economic devastation inflicted by Covid globally, China was elected as a member with the lowest number of votes. Now here it stands, with a sheen of credibility provided by the UN, the study said.

Then on May 4, China was further embedded into the UN system. China's Vice Minister in the Ministry of Commerce, Xiangchen Zhang, was appointed as one of four new Deputy Directors-General of the World Trade Organization (WTO) along with the US, France, and Costa Rica.

While the world was preoccupied with opening the Chinese internal market, China spent years preparing to dominate and leave its mark on the external global system. In fact, it has been part of China's global agenda since 1992, the study said.

By 1997, China was a member of 20 per cent of multilateral organisations, up from 12 per cent in 1989, and by 2002, started to create new ones, like the Shanghai Cooperation Organization.

Over the last two decades, ever since it entered the WTO in 2001, China has set out to influence the global multilateral system.

The participation has grown more sophisticated over the years. China has carefully chosen clusters of agencies to lead, whose work can be interwoven with and are interlinked to its own domestic agendas like 'Made in China 2025', and the rise of Chinese companies. The multilateral agenda includes creating new global standards for technology, which can be led by China and its national corporate champions.

These in turn, are linked to China's foreign policy strategy led by the Belt and Road Initiative, which has its own expansion plans the Digital Silk Road, Space Silk Road, and the Health Silk Road. The expanding influence is enabled by China's increased monetary contribution to the UN, both mandatory as a UN member, and increasingly, voluntary donations. According to this study, these have risen by 1096 per cent and 346 per cent respectively from 2010 to 2019.6

The study found that China is present either as the head or a deputy position in almost all the critical international agencies.

China directly heads four of the 15 principal agencies of the UN- FAO, UNIDO, ITU, ICAO.

Chinese deputies are present in nine of the 15 agencies - World Bank, International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD), International Monetary Fund (IMF), IMO, UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), World Tourism Organization (UNWTO), WHO and the World Meteorological Organization (WMO).

The study said China influences UN agencies through its proxies. The current Director-General of the WHO, Tedros Adhenoum Ghebreysus was elected with China's support in 2017. He is the former health and foreign minister of Ethiopia, which is one of the largest recipients of Chinese investments in Africa. IANS

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