 Hello and welcome to Daily Debrief brought to you by People's Dispatch. I am Shreya. In today's episode, we look at West Asia where Iran and Saudi Arabia have agreed to re-establish diplomatic relations. The agreement was reached on Friday, March 10 during talks in Beijing. Meanwhile, another interesting development in Beijing comes as President Xi Jinping secured a historic third term as President extending his tenure by another five years. An important development for West Asia took place on March 10, Friday as Iran and Saudi Arabia announced to re-establish diplomatic relations. The agreement between the two regional rivals was reached following talks brokered by Beijing. The countries have also decided to re-open their embassies within two months. In 2016, Saudi Arabia had cut its ties with Iran after protesters attacked the Saudi embassy in Tehran following Riyadh's execution of the Shia leader Nimr al-Nimr. The latest agreement holds significance for two reasons. It is the coming together of two regional poles of power and for the role played by China. We are joined by newsclicks Prabir Purkayastha to talk more about this issue. Thank you so much for joining us for this episode Prabir. We are glad to have you back. A very important development taking place in Asia and a lot of change in terms of who are the players, who and the involvement of China like we just talked about earlier and most importantly the relationship that Iran and Saudi have shared historically in several parameters and also politically. So there's a lot going on here and has a larger implications as well. Could you start off by explaining like what is the you know the significance, the pressing significance of this announcement? You know this is important for a particular reason which is of course that oil is a critical resource for the whole world. It really underpins the energy structure of the world at the moment still. It produces not only in Europe both LNG and oil produce also electricity. Obviously for automobiles, for cars, for trucks, buses. It's a huge resource that is required in almost all countries and also if we look at it even deeper, it's also a feedstock for various chemical processes, fertilizers and so on. So this energy structure is crucially dependent still on West Asia. Why is it so? Because the US is a big player, Russia is a big player. It is also supplying a lot to the international market but West Asia has really huge resources which are not used in the region so much. Therefore the surplus of this to the rest of the world countries like India and China are of course extremely significant. So it plays an outsized role in the world because of the strategic significance of the hydrocarbon economy. So to say we may talk about global warming, how should get away from this but right now it is also what Europe wants to call transitional fuel. How could I correct that is a different question but there's no question. The hydrocarbon economy is very important for the world. It underpins our energy infrastructure. Given that the fact that there are fissures or divisions in the area between the countries means for outside powers it makes it easier to intervene and therefore the Iran-Saudi Arabia contest so to say in the region also allowed a power like for instance Israel to believe it could create fissures on those who oppose Israel support the Palestine people and particularly the Palestine state which effectively has never been allowed to come into play really earn its independent status by Israel. Given that that if Iran and Saudi Arabia come together then the fissures the divisions among the Arab states and among what are called the Sunni-Shia states all of that then goes away or at least diminishes considerably. Of course there is still the issue of Yemen where Saudis and Iran are an opposite side so that issue has not yet been settled but the potential is there but it does create a much more of a shall we say resistance to Israeli politics in the area and particularly may therefore change the equation for Palestine or the forces within Palestine given Israel right now has a really right wing government that is going all out to crush even internal resistance as well as resistance from the Palestinians but leaving that out for the moment so I think this is a huge change for West Asia and what the West likes to call Middle East geographically that's something very difficult for us to see because it's to the west of us so it's really a huge change for the area and particularly for United States which has considered itself the mentor of West Asia including the Carter doctrine which said essentially that West Asia's oil is a strategic resource for the United States and therefore the Carter doctrine essentially meant what the cartoons in our times when we are young used to say their oil our oil is under their sand that was the supposed to be the American imagination that it is their oil America's oil which is under Arab sands now this vision is of course also going to have a significant change because if Iran and Saudi Arabia come together then all the other countries in the region whether it is Syria whether it is Emirates whether it is you know Iraq all of them then can start coming together as a West Asian region and therefore the possibility of peace in the region providing a more unified and this you know understanding against for instance what Israel has been trying to do but also playing its role in the world in a much better way than the world intervening in West Asia so I think this is a huge change particularly as you might be aware that Saudi Arabia is of course the largest reserve of oil but also the largest one of the largest exporter the largest exporter in fact and the fact that it was always delegated in dollars meant also the dollar hegemony of the United States was also being maintained so I think Saudi is now making up with Iran Saudis earlier deciding to sell their oil in the Chinese to the Chinese in Chinese currency all of this are herbingers of change which will be in the US will no longer be the arbiter of the region other players are also going to play their role right and on that note Trabir like you mentioned a very important element of this agreement is that it's been brokered by China and this somewhere signals towards the changing power dynamics in the region when it comes to the influence of US and now something like this happening with the brokering with the mediation from China so what can be the implications I think you hinted towards it in the earlier question as well for the rest of the countries and what does it say to the so-called say about the so-called great power rivalry in the region you know the great power rivalry is a concept which sort of comes from colonial times so I don't think that that should be the framework with which we see these things in fact it's also interesting that's what the ex-colonial and the settler colonial powers would like to talk about the world they see it in terms of great power rivalry with the British and the French the Americans talking about the Monroe doctrine that this is really our hemisphere I don't think that's the way to see the question is can we have a different way of saying international issues and increasingly whether we can have a cooperative framework rather than a competitive framework now one part of the cooperative framework if was if you could have a trade equation in which all countries can trade with each other the question of currency becomes then of course important whose currency and that's why the global currency being dollar was gives United States a whip hand over the global trade as well as the financial markets the second part of it is if it is not competition then of course it makes it much easier for countries to trade with each other in a different way now as you can see that the world trade organization WTO's concept supposedly of free trade was very useful for the United States in the west at one point to capture other people's markets but now that they don't have that kind of hegemony you can see that they are starting what would be called the great power rivalry as you talked about and the sanctions on Russia of course with the Ukraine war being the trigger but also sanctions on China so given all of that the fact that China has emerged not only as a largest trade partner of 80 countries in the world over the last 20 years displacing United States from that position also means that China's role is becoming politically much more important and don't forget this is really Asia China is close to Central Asia it's one border of Central Asia Russia's another border of Central Asia other border of Central Asia is Iran so all of this regions if along with West Asia you get that Eurasian land mass minus South Asia because we actually and Southeast Asia are not a part of this region then there is a dynamic which is developing which means that this region can emerge as a political player in its own right and it does not need to indulge in who rules over whom because what China seems to be doing with also the belt road initiative that it is partnership of the economies we give you technology we'll give you knowledge we'll build infrastructure and that's what really attracts out the Arabia we'll build inductive infrastructure we'll be other infrastructure for you in exchange for you whatever you can give us in the case of West Asia obviously oil also for Central Asia the other issues minerals and so on so whether the cooperative picture can emerge rather than a great power rivalry is the issue because Central Asia originally was always the great game which was really competition between colonial parts and of course Russia as well so given that is the world changing and I think it's a very important harbinger of change really indicator of change when Saudi Arabia and Iran both by no means allies of China in the past are asking China to negotiate as an honest broker between them and the peace agreement is being signed in China so I think that's a very very significant indicator that the fulcrum in the world today is not just the United States but also China because it's such a large economic power and therefore we are seeing multiple poles emerge today and also the role of bricks might become in the future very important because bricks is really China India Russia Brazil South Africa all continents and their current GDP if you're taking in purchasing power parity terms it's just a little more than the G7s therefore the economic weight in the world of course purchasing power parity is not the same as the dollar value of the economy so that G7 still leads but the fact is purchasing power parity is what people see when you buy and sell within the country that's what you see so this the fact that bricks 5 is already bigger than G7 is an indicator also the economic weight is changing and I think that is why you will see increasingly whether it is Africa whether it's Asia whether it's Latin America you will see countries will say we'll settle our differences ourselves we don't need the big brother United States telling us what to do and right now after West Asia the conflict is really in Africa and because I think Latin American countries are more capable of asserting themselves though they haven't till date but Mexico Brazil Colombia all of these countries Chile Argentina all of them have the ability to decide how they want to run things in Latin America I think the next part of this which is going to play out in Africa and China's influence there is not inconsiderable and Russia has also has residual long term goodwill because of the role it played in decolonization of Africa I think so this is the harbinger of very interesting times that you have really a country which has never been instrumental in making peace between two major other countries not in its fear of influence by a long shot but it should be seen by the two contestants as the country to mediate between the two of them I think that's a very very important change that we are seeing today right very rightly said Praveer I think this is a development that has global implications and one that needs to be closely watched out for thank you so much for joining us today China's President Xi Jinping secured a third term retaining his position as president for another five years on Friday March 10 nearly 3,000 members at the National People's Congress voted unanimously in the great hall of the people for the 69-year-old Xi he came to power as president in 2013 and was also elected for a record third term as general secretary of the ruling communist party in October 2022 on March 11 Li Qiang the former communist party chief of Shanghai took up the country's second highest post on Saturday putting the close ally of Mr. Xi in charge of reviving an economy battered by three years of COVID-19 we're now joined by Anish from People's Dispatch to talk about these latest developments so first question first is that what really happened at the parliamentary at this parliamentary session can you explain it to us so yeah so the the session that is about to conclude uh actually concluded uh is the what is called as the two sessions uh in most mainstream media outlets basically uh uh you know a consecutive session not a consecutive a parallel set of two sessions held by one the National People's Congress which is the highest legislative body of China and the national consultative body which is basically a united front of not just the Communist Party of China but also members of the United Front parties that are part of the member of part of the United Front that rules China so most people don't know this but technically speaking despite the most you know a very unique part a single party dominance or a single party controlled state China is technically speaking led by a coalition of about a dozen political parties uh that had created a united front during the Chinese revolutions so it is uh so this body doesn't really have the sort of legislative or executive powers as the National People's Congress does but uh they are significant because they do uh from a part of a larger consultative body which includes uh you know different sectors ranging from industrialists to trade unions to youth movements and women's movements being part of this coalition so it is generally a massive consultative process that has come to an end and we have seen uh significant uh measures and policy measures actually uh taken up because eventually the NPC is the one that uh frames uh you know the body of the state's uh policy directives and it is these policy directives that will be uh you know uh that will actually lead the country for the next one year uh that will actually uh inform government policies of all matters or at least most of the matters uh for the next one year and we have seen the focus this time being on uh rejuvenating the growth rate uh not just uh on a quantitative term as in just basic numbers on GDP growth but also in in qualitative terms with special attention being given to science and technology research development uh and also to uh boost the high-tech industry industrial sector that is now growing and you know coming to coming of age in many ways in china to an actual global leader and this is what they want uh to actually lead their economic growth uh at least for the next five years that Xi Jinping would be uh president at least and so these measures are definitely part of an overall scheme to uh basically push China's uh you know economic power forward uh but in a manner that is uh you know driven by advancements in science and technology and this is significant considering the fact that the United States is right now making measures uh that is trying that will attempt to choke at least several of China's uh you know technological uh field and advancement and also its research development also anish can you tell us about the significance of this third term yeah so it is not necessarily uh just the fact that Xi Jinping has been re-elected for a third term it is not unprecedented in China's history obviously uh but it is the fact that he's also coming with a very new team of state council a new administration that will be overseeing uh the state reforms that are that have been passed by the national Congress uh key among them is basically Li Chiang who was very recently elevated to the second senior most position after Xi Jinping in the Politburo Standing Committee which is the highest you know political body within the Chinese Communist Party and you have other members including Li Wuxiang who was a member in fact the leader of the China's national trade union confederation and you have other members as well who were you know who were administrators who ran cities who were also faces of the uh the COVID-19 pandemic as in the the zero COVID policy that was implemented and also in the aftermath when uh aftermath of winding down of the zero COVID policy so you have actually uh faces that were very crucial for the last two or three years in running uh not only the grassroots of the China's economy but also uh informing the national policy on counter-pandemic and also the economic fallouts of this pandemic uh so definitely bringing them to uh you know to the national state council you have a very clear vision of revival of the economy and at the same time a very you know key focus on you know a very qualitative and also regimented uh growth targets that the new government will be pushing for in the next five years so this is definitely a sort of a significant push forward if you see for China domestically speaking obviously in the foreign policy issues you will have a very similar set of policies but there is definitely an attempt to address a certain and the encirclement policy obviously of the United States especially with you know focus on science and technological development so these factors will also be part of the fact that this new uh you know this new cabinet that has been formed uh will be taking on will be taking head on in the next couple of years right thank you so much for joining us Anish yeah and that's all we have for today for most stories follow our website peoplesdispatch.org you can also follow us on facebook twitter and instagram