Two Chinese container vessels have set sails for European ports thorough the Bering Strait in the Arctic Circle. The first vessel, Xin Xin Hai 1, capable of carrying a little over 1200 containers, left the port of Taicang near Shanghai on 5 July and is currently sailing along the Northern Sea Route (NSR). It is being escorted by a nuclear powered icebreaker named Sibir. A week later, the second vessel Xin Xin Hai 2, departed the Chinese port of Rizhao, is also bound for European ports. Several other container ships (capable of carrying around 5,000 TEU) of other international shipping companies have received permission to sail along the Northern Sea Route, but are waiting for more ice to melt along the route.

It is well known that Arctic sea ice is shrinking rapidly, and scientists and climate model simulations predict that the Arctic will be ice-free in next two or three decades. This phenomena offers opportunities in the form of shorter shipping routes connecting the Pacific and the Atlantic Oceans through the Arctic Ocean. The volume of cargo traffic along the NSR was the highest in 2023 (36.254 million tons) up 250,000 from 34.117 million tons of in 2022. Much of it was Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) accounting for over a half of the cargo traffic.

China’s interest in the Polar Regions dates back to 1980s and it has accumulated rich scientific data and experience. It has conducted 39 Antarctic scientific explorations since 1984, and 12 expeditions to the Arctic since 1999. In 1997 it joined the International Arctic Science Committee (IASC), and in July 2004, set up a research station, Huanghe (Yellow River), at Ny-Alesund in Norway’s Svalbard archipelago.

The Chinese leadership has endorsed the importance of the Arctic region. In 2013 President Xi Jinping stated that ‘Polar affairs have a unique role in [China’s] marine development strategy and the process of becoming a polar power is an important component of China’s process to become maritime great power.’

In 2018, China published a White Paper titled ‘China’s Arctic Policy’ which states that China is a “near Arctic state” and “important stakeholder” in Arctic. It is therefore important for China to exercise the right to conduct scientific research, freedom of navigation and overflight, fishery activities, cable and pipeline laying, and resource exploitation in the region.

China considers the NSR as the Polar Silk Road (PSR) and an alternative to the conventional sea route from China to Europe through the Indian Ocean which in recent times has gained notoriety on account of piracy in the Gulf of Aden and more recently due to attacks by Yemen based Houthi rebels who have attacked merchant vessels with drones and missiles forcing the shipping companies to reroute vessels and follow the longer route around the Cape of Good Hope.

The PSR is also the geo-economic arm of China’s Arctic strategy wherein it plans to establish economically viable and profitable investments, and spawn political and strategic influence through interdependences. Chinese companies CNPC, CNOOC and Silk Road Fund are engaged in the Russian Yamal LNG and the Arctic LNG 2 projects. In March 2023, President Putin told President Xi Jinping that his country was “ready to create a joint working organ on the development of the Northern Sea Route”.

Discussions about Chinese military interests in the Arctic merit attention. The former U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo was concerned that “China’s expansion could even transform the Arctic into a new South China Sea, fraught with militarization and competing territorial claims”. There is also a view that “a combination of nuclear submarines and state-owned icebreakers could establish a Chinese military presence in the Arctic to both secure Chinese interests and to deny control of the seas by other great powers”.

China is investing in Arctic infrastructure, shipping routes, and energy projects to gain influence in the region. It operates two ice breakers i.e. Xuelong 1 and Xuelong 2 and these vessels service the seven Chinese stations in the Arctic and Antarctic regions. A new polar class vessel capable of operating drones and underwater autonomous robots for deep polar seabed exploration has been added to the fleet of icebreakers. The fourth icebreaker is a next-generation research vessel and is named Ji Di. It is under construction at Guangzhou Shipyard International and will be able to “completely systematised the research system of the entire ice zone, that is, including the North and South Poles,”

It is quite plausible that China could blend civil and military infrastructure for sustained presence in the region. Earlier this year, Chinese Coast Guard and Federal Security Service of Russia signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) on strengthening maritime law enforcement cooperation. Last year, Russia invited a Chinese delegation to participate as an observer in Arctic Patrol 2023, a large-scale exercise in the Barents Sea. It is fair to argue that China sees the melting of the Arctic ice as an opportunity to not only develop resources-routes, but also explore military deployments.

Dr. Vijay Sakhuja is Professor and Head, Center of Excellence for Geopolitics and International Studies (CEGIS), REVA University, Bengaluru and is associated with Kalinga International Foundation, New Delhi.