China Arms the North of Sudan, Courts the Oil-Rich Separatist South

Condensed from “Chinese Interests Face Predicament in Sudan Vote,” copyright Joe Lauria, the Wall Street Journal, published in the Cambodia Daily on Oct. 25, 2010.  All text is copyright Lauria/the Wall Street Journal.

JUBA, SUDAN – China is courting the secessionist government of oil-rich Sudan, in an apparent departure from Beijing's decades-long opposition to independence movements abroad.
     Sudan, after constant civil war over the past five decades, is seeing tensions boil again ahead of a planned independence referendum early next year that stands to split Africa's largest country in two.  Voters from the largely Christian south are expected to vote to break away from the country's largely Muslim north.  As the Jan 9, 2011, election approaches, both sides have accused the other of amassing troops.
     [D]espite its recent overtures to the south, Beijing seeks to maintain its long-standing economic ties with Khartoum, the seat of Sudan's government and center of northern power.  China armed and supported the north in the 23-year civil war in the south from 1983 to 2005, in which 2 million people are believed to have died.  It continues to arm Khartoum and has built the north infrastructure projects, including the largest hydroelectric dam in Africa.
     China has a very pragmatic reason for tolerating the south: It is home to 80 percent of Sudan's oil reserves, including most of the China National Petroleum Corp's four oil concessions, granted to it by Khartoum.