Wen Jiabao to bolster strong Pakistan ties after India

Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao arrived in Pakistan on Friday armed with multi-billion dollar deals to reassure its ally that military and economic ties remain tight, despite China's warming relations with India.

Wen, who flew in after a two-day visit to India, is expected to sign off on trade and business deals worth about $19 billion, a senior government official told Reuters. He is also likely to pledge Chinese help to develop a strategic port.

His visit is to assure old friend Pakistan that China's improving ties with India do not come at Pakistan's expense.

Ties between nuclear-armed rivals India and Pakistan remain tense over a host of issues, and China's alliance with Pakistan irks India.

Wen used more than $16 billion in trade deals and promises of political support to charm India into temporarily setting aside disputes with China.

But Pakistan is getting even sweeter deals. The two sides are expected to sign 14 agreements in areas of trade, health, education, agriculture, energy and infrastructure worth between $10 billion and $14 billion, a government  official said.                                    

On Saturday, businessmen from the two countries are expected to ink more deals worth about $4.8 billion, the official said.

Some of the agreements between the governments would come into force immediately while others would be implemented between 2011 and 2016, he added.                                             

Two-way trade during Jan-Sept, 2010 stood at $6.2 billion, an increase of nearly 30% compared to the same  period last year, according to official figures. The two countries aim to increase their bilateral trade to $15 billion by 2015.      

"China still looks at Pakistan and India through the same lens," said Hamayoun Khan, an independent analyst and  former China-Pakistan expert at the Institute of Strategic  Studies. "Whereas the US considers Pakistan as part of Af-Pak and India as a separate country, which is not taken  well in Pakistan."

According to a Pew survey of Pakistan public opinion last year, 84% of respondents said they had a favorable few  of China, and 16% had a favorable view of the United  States.

Ties that bind Pakistani diplomats like to refer to China as an  "all-weather friend", whose needs - strategic and economic - fit in with what Pakistan wants and has to offer.

"It's a question of where each country finds itself and gets the most out of the other," said Talat Masood, an independent defence analyst. 

While China is India's largest trade partner, it invests  seven times more in Pakistan and is helping it build nuclear reactors, despite grave misgivings in the West.

China wants to use Pakistan as a gateway to the Muslim world and as a new Silk Road for China's energy-hungry interior, as well as a balance against India's military rise.

Pakistan, in turn, plans to further rely on China for the bulk of its weapon systems, as a major investor for its ports and roads, and as a counter-weight to American demands and  conditions in the fight against Islamist militancy.     

Wen is expected to spend almost exactly the same amount of time in Islamabad that he did in New Delhi.

A key topic will be Pakistan's deep-water, strategic  Gwadar port, on the Arabian Sea coast, in which China has  already invested $200 million.

Singapore's state-owned PSA International Ltd. was given a 40-year contract to run the port, but Pakistan is contesting that in court, and wants more Chinese involvement, officials said.

The port will help Pakistan, struggling to revive its  debt-laden economy, to become a conduit for trade to  landlocked Afghanistan and Central Asia. It would also enable  China to ship oil from the Gulf to its interior more directly.                 

India, of course, will loom large during talks: both Pakistan and China want to hem in India as a rising military  power.

"In a way they give us (Pakistan), say, annually $2  billion," said analyst Khan. "What do we do? ... We're a pain  in the ass for the Indians."

Chinese weapon sales to Pakistan, which make up a significant chunk of its annual arms exports, focus less on  counter terrorism and counterinsurgency as favoured by the United States, and more on fighter jets, air-to-air missiles,  tanks and other conventional weapons systems.

Such sales, as well as close diplomatic ties, mean China encourages Pakistan's military focus on India, to the annoyance of the United States, Pakistan's other major ally.

The United States wants Pakistan to rein in its homegrown militants and tackle sanctuaries for al-Qaeda, the Afghan Taliban and other groups on its western border with Afghanistan.

But Pakistan appears more willing to help out China with its militant concerns than the United States in its war against the Taliban in Afghanistan, a country where Pakistan is seeking a prominent role in shaping any post-conflict  government.