Neil Thomas

China already had a defence trade relationship with Iran, a close economic partner in the region.

We know there's been exports and imports of arms going both ways in the previous years and decades.

So what's less clear is whether these reports refer to things that were already happening before the war started, or do they represent an escalation in the sense of being an active effort to help Iran fight this war better?

That's where I'm a little bit...

more skeptical because that would prolong the fighting and that would have an impact on China's economy and extend this crunch on global energy markets.

So it's possible it's a big watch point, but I'm not sure we have all the evidence we need just yet.

That's right.

So in a call with the Emirati crown prince, Mohammed bin Zayed, she came out with this four-point initiative for Middle East peace.

And very briefly, it's peaceful coexistence, it's national sovereignty, international rule of law and balancing development and security, which all sounds wonderful.

But what does it actually mean?

And thus far, we haven't really seen China play much of a role in getting its hands dirty in the diplomacy of getting a resolution between the US and Iran.

As far as we can tell so far, Beijing's been keeping a distance from the diplomatic action here because it doesn't want to alienate the US, it doesn't want to alienate Iran, it doesn't want to alienate all the other close partners it has in the Middle East, including the Gulf states, which do not have good relations with Iran.

So it sounds wonderful, but thus far there's not much behind these beautiful words.

It wants to project itself as a force for stability, predictability, for peace on the world stage.

Notably, the Spanish Prime Minister, Pedro Sanchez, was in town actually the same day that she had the call with the Emirati Crown Prince.

And

Sanchez quite directly called on Xi to play a bigger role in the world stage and to pressure the Iranians and the Americans to bring the conflict to an end.

And so far, I think those calls have fallen on relatively deaf ears, but it's certainly exactly the kind of calls

sentiment that Beijing wants to be generating, right?

People turning to Beijing as an oasis of stability in a world that she herself has said is increasingly in disarray.