DNA Edit: Back to square one - China & Masood Azhar’s links among best secrets

China has demonstrated that a powerful country does not buckle down under any international pressure, no matter what the cost. If it means a loss of face or the threat of being branded soft on terror, be it so.

For the dragon,  the protection of its interests are paramount. China’s over riding compulsion to portray hard power is significantly higher than its urge to present its soft power credentials. For a fourth time, China on Wednesday put on hold a proposal at the UN for a ban on Jaish-e-Mohammed (JeM) chief Masood Azhar, halting a renewed push by France, the US and the UK to blacklist the Pakistan-based terrorist after the Pulwama attack.

It has thrice earlier put the same proposal on a `technical hold` before finally terminating the proposal. The hold lasts for a maximum period of nine months, after which China can again use its veto power to formally block or terminate the proposal.

Beijing has yet again shown that it can balance its bilateral and multilateral relations deftly - good neighbourliness be dammed. While leading Chinese Communist Party editorials have openly written about being neutral in the eventuality of an Indo-Pakistan standoff, it has not come in the way of Beijing defending its all weather friend, Pakistan.

While Pakistan has attracted global opprobrium as a safe haven of terrorists, for China that is not the main issue. What is more important are its economic interests in Pakistan. The $62 billion China Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC), a collection of infrastructure projects under construction in Pakistan, is one of its most ambitious and passes though the Af-Pak region, a hotbed for terror groups.

Beijing also considers Masood Azhar and his JeM as important cogs for the security and stability of its restive Xinjiang province. Azhar is China’s man to ensure the security of its geostrategic investments. In other words, Azhar is China’s staunch ally and it would be ambitious to expect it to abandon a man so useful. China’s close links to terrorists in the Af-Pak region has a historical legacy based on its vested economic, security and geostrategic interests.

China’s Muslim-dominated Xinjiang province came under the religious and cultural influence of Pakistan, as it opened in its post-reform period after 1978. It is well known that Pakistani mullahs started teaching the fundamentals of Islam and their distorted interpretation of jihad to inflame the Uyghurs in the wake of Afghanistan, during this period.

Some of this little known linkage between Beijing and Azhar was evident after the Pulwama attack, when China was virtually the last country in the world to issue its somewhat tepid condolence message. Its official statement lacked any direct reference to either Azhar or his terror group, for reasons that are now perfectly understandable.

Clearly, Sino-Indian relations, which appeared to be warming a bit after the meeting between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Chinese President Xi Jinping at Wuhan last year, is going to go into a deep chill.