China may send warships to Somalia coast
Beijing's move to possibly send naval vessels to the Gulf of Aden comes as pirates are kept from taking over a Chinese commercial ship.
Reporting from Beijing — China signaled Wednesday that it may send warships to help fight pirates off the coast of Somalia, a sign of its increasing willingness to flex its military muscle.
Although China has participated in United Nations peacekeeping operations in Africa, its navy has seldom left the Pacific region.
China's deputy foreign minister, He Yafei, was quoted by the state news agency as saying that China was "seriously considering sending naval ships to the Gulf of Aden and waters off the Somali coast for escorting operations in the near future."
The remarks during a ministerial meeting of the U.N. Security Council were the first by a senior Chinese official confirming widespread speculation the last few weeks.
The state-controlled press has been rallying support recently for such a mission with editorials that refer to China's "responsibility" as well as to what the English-language China Daily called an opportunity to "get into the thick of the action." An online poll published by the newspaper today reported that 90% of respondents supported the mission.
China is the only permanent member of the Security Council that has not joined the United States in a growing international fleet fighting a brazen wave of piracy launched from Somalia's shores. Among other participants are Denmark, Greece, Turkey, Italy and Malaysia.
"As part of the U.N. Security Council, China has the responsibility to maintain the international peace and security; it also has to do so to protect its own interests," said Liu Naiya, an Africa specialist at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences in Beijing. "Fighting piracy is consistent with the global war against terrorism."
For the Chinese, the urgency of the mission was underscored by an attack in the Gulf of Aden on Wednesday against a ship owned by the China Communications Construction Co. The 30 crew members barricaded themselves in their cabins until they were rescued by a multinational force that reportedly swooped in with helicopters. Two other Chinese ships have been attacked since mid-November.
The Global Times, a newspaper considered close to the ruling Communist Party, reported that Chinese naval vessels would leave the South China Sea for a deployment in the Gulf of Aden for three months
The Chinese navy has not left the Pacific region except for what have been called goodwill tours -- the most ambitious being a four-month, 10-nation tour by two warships in 2002. During that tour, the ships conducted anti-piracy exercises in the Straits of Malacca.
