Ongoing upheaval in Pakistan unlikely to destabilise military ties with China: Report

INTERNATIONAL DESK: The military cooperation between China and Pakistan is “extensive and deep.” The ongoing political and economic upheaval in Pakistan is unlikely to affect the military relationship between China and Pakistan, Observer Research Foundation reported.

The depth of cooperation between China and Pakistan can be assumed by Wang Yi, who was China’s erstwhile foreign minister and now director of the Office of the Foreign Affairs Commission (OFAC) of the Communist Party of China (CPC) statement that China backs Pakistan’s sovereignty, territorial integrity, stability, and unity despite the ongoing domestic crisis in Pakistan, Kartik Bommakanti, Senior Fellow with the Strategic Studies Programme at the Observer Research Foundation wrote in the report.

The Peoples Liberation Army’s (PLA) senior leadership and Central Military Commission (CMC), do not consider the current crisis of Pakistan affecting the bilateral ties, Observer Research Foundation reported. During the Pakistani Navy Chief Amjad Khan Niazi’s visit to China in 2023, Chinese Defence Minister Li Shangfu stressed that military cooperation stood at the core of the bilateral ties.

Steadiness is a constant in the strategic ties between China and Pakistan. The closeness of the Sino-Pak military poses a security challenge to its immediate neighbour India. China aids Pakistan by directly transferring its nuclear technology. Beijing also supplied Pakistan with ballistic missiles such as the M-9 and M-11, as per the report.

The ties between China and Pakistan in the space sector cover Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance (ISR) and satellite navigation services. China has extended cooperation with Pakistan in space exploration, science, and astronaut training areas for many years. China has also involved Pakistan in their indigenously-built BeiDou Satellite Navigation (SatNav) system since 2013.

In 2020, the Chinese Satellite Navigation Office (CSNO) agreed to set up the BeiDou-linked Continuously Operating Radar Station (CORS) in Pakistan, Kartik Bommakanti wrote in the report. The BeiDou SatNav capability should augment Rawalpindi’s precision strike capabilities geared towards counterforce attacks. The BeiDou system will increase interoperability between Chinese and Pakistani forces.

Recently, China supplied the Pakistanis with an SLC-18 radar system. It is an Active Electronically Scanned Array (AESA) integrated with digital technology, which can search, track, and detect satellites in Low Earth Orbit (LEO) and ballistic missiles, according to the Observer Research Foundation report. The SLC-18 is an advanced capability developed by China, showcasing the “deep nexus” between the two nations.

Two years back, the Pakistan Army (PA) acquired the Chinese-made Air Defence (AD) system HQ-9/P from China. H9-9/P, which is likely to enhance Pakistan’s capability against aerial threats, bringing to the notice another dimension of the collusive threat posed by India’s two immediate neighbours. (ANI)