中国和俄罗斯关系日渐融洽——至少目前如此

新闻来源: CNN 于December 07, 2006

TWO years ago, Irina Abdulova, a sociologist in the Siberian city of Irkutsk, noticed a change. The town's racist graffiti had until then been directed mostly at Caucasians, reviled all over Russia. But in 2004 it found a new target: the Chinese. www.csuchen.de/

2年前,俄罗斯西伯利亚城市伊尔库茨克的一位社会学家伊琳娜·阿卜杜洛娃注意到了一丝变化。在那之前,该市的种族主义分子在墙壁上的涂鸦大都是针对高加索人的。俄罗斯到处充斥着对他们的谩骂之声。而在2004年,这些谩骂之声有了新的宣泄对象:中国人。 www.csuchen.de/

One can see why bigots in search of bogeymen found China so promising. Since the Soviet collapse, the population of Siberia and Russia's vast Far East region has fallen even faster than that of the country as a whole. In the Far East, it has tumbled from around 8m in 1991 to around 6.5m today, while a total of 107m people live in three neighbouring provinces of China. As Russian numbers sag, and as Chinese traders and labourers become more visible in Russian cities, fearful talk of the “yellow peril” has flourished. The Chinese are said to be swarming across the Amur river to carry off raw materials and women. www.csuchen.de/

我们可以看看为什么这些痴迷于寻找妖魔鬼怪的人会认为中国是他们的最好目标。前苏联解体后,西伯利亚和俄罗斯广大远东地区的人口数量急剧下降,速度甚至超过了解体前。远东地区的人口从1991年的约800万人猛跌至今天的约650万人,而与其相邻的三个中国省份则居住着1.07亿人。随着俄罗斯人口的减少,以及中国的商人和务工者在俄罗斯城市中日益增多,“黄祸”的可怕议论开始甚嚣尘上。据称,中国人正蜂拥渡过阿穆尔河(译注:即黑龙江),要夺去俄罗斯的原材料和女人。 www.csuchen.de/

Yet at the same time, much of Siberia's population is clad in cheap Chinese-made apparel and fed by traders from China. Businesses crave Chinese workers, for want of sober indigenous ones. In Siberian towns like Zabaikalsk (pictured above), Chinese street markets have brought a dash of colour and cheap goods. So even as they mutter racist slogans, members of Siberia's Lumpenproletariat benefit from proximity to the dragon. www.csuchen.de/

但与此同时,许多西伯利亚人正身着廉价的中国制造的衣服并由中国的商人们所养活。当地商业急需中国工人,因为缺少清醒的本地劳动力。在像后贝加尔斯克(见上图)这些西伯利亚城市,中国商人开设的街头市场带来了些许花花绿绿的廉价商品。因此,这些西伯利亚的“流氓无产者”们在嘟囔着种族口号时,也因为靠近中国龙而从中受益。 www.csuchen.de/

There is a similar tension in the broader relationship between the world's former superpower and its rising one. The Soviet Union and China had their own cold war, which fully thawed after Mikhail Gorbachev visited Beijing in 1989. Now, says Alexander Lukin, of the Moscow State Institute of International Relations, relations between the two states are at an all-time high. A dispute over the border (one of the world's longest, and the cause of a war in 1969) was settled in 2004. More visibly, the two countries last year staged their first joint war games, involving around 10,000 troops. Given China's disdain for military alliances (it technically has one with North Korea, dating from 1961, which it would rather forget), staging the manoeuvres on Chinese soil was a big gesture. www.csuchen.de/

这个世界前超级大国和正在崛起的国家在边境关系上也存在类似的紧张关系。前苏联和中国曾进行过冷战,两国关系在米哈伊尔·戈尔巴乔夫1989年访问北京时才得以完全解冻。莫斯科国立国际关系学院的亚力山大·鲁金说,两国关系现在处于历史最好时期。两国的边境问题(世界最长的边界之一,也是造成1969年冲突的原因)于2004年得以解决。更为明显的是,两国去年举行了约有10,000名士兵参加的首次联合军演。考虑到中国对军事联盟(中国和朝鲜自1961年起在技术上保持着某种军事联盟关系,但中国宁愿没有这一联盟)不屑一顾的态度,在中国的土地上与外军举行军演不啻是一个巨大的姿态。 www.csuchen.de/

Russia and China drew closer during NATO's air wars in the Balkans, which they both opposed. Since then they have made common cause against what both see as the risk of American “hegemony”. Both also see the United Nations Security Council, where they have permanent seats, as their best arena. After September 2001, both were alarmed by America's new military presence in Central Asia (the Shanghai Co-operation Organisation, a regional grouping that they dominate, last year asked the Americans to set a date for their withdrawal). Both, too, resent foreign criticism of their domestic human-rights records, and outside meddling in what they see as illegitimate separatism in Chechnya and Taiwan. Solidarity on that issue was one message of the war games: though their stated purpose was to restore order in an imaginary country riven by ethnic fighting, they looked very much like a rehearsal for invading Taiwan. www.csuchen.de/

俄罗斯和中国因都反对北约空袭巴尔干地区而使两国关系日趋紧密。自那时起,他们就联合起来,反对他们视为风险的美国“霸权”。两国作为安理会常任理事国,都认为联合国是他们最好的舞台。“9·11”过后,美国加大对中亚的军事渗透力度引起了两国的警觉(由他们主导的地区组织、上海合作组织去年要求美国制定从中亚撤军的日期)。两国还都对外国批评其国内人权记录,以及外部势力插手他们视为存在非法分离主义的车臣和台湾感到不满。两国在这一问题上的团结一致正是军演要传递的信息之一:虽然他们宣称的目的是恢复出现种族冲突的某假想国的秩序,但看起来,他们非常像是在演练“入侵”台湾。 www.csuchen.de/

The mutual attraction reflects positive factors too. China has long been the biggest buyer of Russian arms (the exercises were also an arms fair). Increasingly dependent on imported oil and gas, it wants to be a big buyer of Russian energy. Three new pipelines—two for gas, and one to bring Siberian oil to the border—are promised by Russia; and high prices have made it viable to deliver Russian oil by train. www.csuchen.de/

相互的吸引也反映了两国关系中的积极因素。中国长期以来一直是俄罗斯军火的最大买家(军演也是一次军火推销)。随着中国对进口石油和天然气的依赖程度日益加大,中国希望购买俄罗斯更多的能源。俄罗斯已答应修建3条新管道,其中2条是天然气管道,另1条石油管道将把西伯利亚的石油输送至俄中边界。由于成本高昂,也有可能由铁路将俄罗斯的石油运至边境。 www.csuchen.de/

Shi Yinhong, of Renmin University in Beijing, argues that ties with America are still more important to China than those with Russia. For China, the two relationships get in each other's way. For example, Russia participates in the six-way talks on North Korea; but China would prefer to monopolise diplomacy in that area, parlaying its supposedly close ties with Pyongyang into leverage with the Americans over Taiwan. Still, as Dmitri Trenin of the Carnegie Moscow Centre says, the Russia-China pairing is no longer merely a sort of diplomatic adultery, used by both to irk America: it has “a dynamic of its own”. www.csuchen.de/

北京人民大学的时殷宏认为,中美关系现在仍然比中俄关系重要得多。对中国而言,这对关系交织在一起,相互影响。例如,俄罗斯参与了朝核问题六方会谈;但中国却更希望在该问题上独自施加外交影响,利用其料想的与平壤的亲密关系作为在台湾问题上与美国讨价还价的筹码。然而,正如卡内基莫斯科中心的迪米特里·特列宁所说的,俄中关系已不再仅仅是两国用来折磨美国的一种外交上的成熟关系,而是“具备了自己的活力”。 www.csuchen.de/

If America is relatively unperturbed by the Russian-Chinese dalliance, that may be because it sees it as fragile. Though geography and economics make the two countries natural partners, the distribution of land, people and resources also makes them rivals. Indeed, the interests now drawing them together contain the seeds of future competition, even conflict. www.csuchen.de/

假使美国能够相对泰然自若地看待俄中亲密关系,那可能是因为美国认为这种关系是脆弱的。尽管地理和经济因素使两国成为天然的合作伙伴,但土地、人口和资源的分布也使他们成为敌手。诚然,现在使他们走到一起的利益之土孕育着未来竞争、甚至是冲突的种子。 www.csuchen.de/

Take bilateral trade. It is booming, to around $30 billion last year. But it is still paltry compared with China's trade with America, and in important ways is disappointing for both sides. The Russians are peeved that China buys little Russian machinery and few manufactured goods. The Chinese, meanwhile, are grateful for the Russian weaponry, from fighter planes to submarines, that has helped modernise their armed forces. But it rankles that the Russians withhold some of their most advanced weapons, even as they sell them to India, which China still eyes with distinct suspicion. www.csuchen.de/

以双边贸易为例。双边贸易去年飞速增长,达到约300亿美元。但与中美贸易额相比仍显得微不足道,而且在重要的领域双方都感到失望。俄罗斯人对中国几乎不采购俄罗斯的机械和制成品感到恼怒。而与此同时,中国虽对购自俄罗斯的武器,包括战机和潜艇,帮助中国军队实现现代化心存感激,但对俄罗斯人保留一些最先进的武器感到不满,特别是俄罗斯还将这些武器卖给中国仍拿明显的怀疑眼光看待的印度。 www.csuchen.de/

The match between Russia's vast hydrocarbon reserves and soaring Chinese energy needs is fraught too. The Russians use the threat of redirecting oil and gas supplies eastward to pressurise their European customers. But prevarication over the construction of new pipelines has both undermined those threats and exasperated the Chinese. Russia has for years been tantalising both China and Japan with a possible pipeline to carry Siberian oil either to China or to the Pacific: a game designed to extract concessions (such as a Chinese promise to buy Russian nuclear technology) that has left both Asian states bitter. The oil pipeline plans are still murky; the gas schemes even sketchier. www.csuchen.de/

俄罗斯丰富的能源储备与中国飞涨的能源需求之间的较量也充满危险。俄罗斯人利用威胁将石油和天然气改向东方供应向他们的东欧客户施压。但在建设新管道方面又一味搪塞,这不仅破坏了威胁的效果,而且激怒了中国人。俄罗斯多年来一直利用运送西伯利亚石油管道的可能走向(铺至中国还是铺至太平洋)将中日玩弄于股掌之间。此举旨在迫使中日两国做出让步(例如中国答应购买俄罗斯的核技术),并使两国苦不堪言。石油管道方案前景仍不明朗,天然气计划则更加模糊了。 www.csuchen.de/

Shared devotion to “multipolarity” in world affairs offers only a temporary bond. When China emerges as an undisputed pole in its own right, Russia will likely seek new partners to counterbalance Chinese power. Joint worries about America's role in Central Asia mask an underlying rivalry for influence and resources. www.csuchen.de/

在世界事务中信奉“多极”的共同信念仅提供了暂时的联系纽带。当中国依靠自身实力成为无可争议的一极后,俄罗斯将很可能寻找新的伙伴制衡中国。对美国在中亚地区作用的共同担心掩盖了两国对影响和资源的潜在竞争关系。 www.csuchen.de/

How these latent tensions are resolved will depend on political developments in both countries, and on how nationalistic each becomes. For Russian nationalists, China is both a threat and a solution to the problem of American power. But the equilibrium of fears may not last. www.csuchen.de/

如何解决这些潜在的紧张关系将视两国的政治与民族主义的发展而定。对俄罗斯民族主义者而言,中国既是一个威胁,也是应对美国强权问题的解决办法。但这种恐惧的平衡可能不会持久。 www.csuchen.de/

Any souring of relations will probably be felt first in Siberia and the Far East. It is striking that, in Irkutsk and elsewhere, fretful Russians always say the really big Chinese communities are somewhere else. But nobody can agree on where—in fact nobody knows how many Chinese there are in Russia. Though some Chinese settle, most are temporary visitors. Talk of the “yellow peril” is as old as it is irrational: Tsarist-era Vladivostok had a special police department to deal with the Chinese population. (Equally old is Russian awe of Chinese workers: a 19th-century writer said admiringly that they “don't drink, work one day after another, don't demand much, and are obedient.”) www.csuchen.de/

两国关系开始交恶的迹象很可能首先在西伯利亚和远东地区感觉到。令人吃惊的是,在伊尔库茨克及其他地方,焦躁的俄罗斯人总是说真正的中国大社区在别的地方。但没有人清楚别的地方在哪里。事实上,根本没有人知道俄罗斯现在有多少中国人。尽管一些中国人在俄罗斯定居,但大多数仍属于临时性的过客。有关“黄祸”的议论与其不合理的历史一样久远。沙皇时代的符拉迪沃斯托克成立了一个特别警察部门处理中国人口问题。(与其一样久远的是俄罗斯对中国工人的敬畏: 19世纪一位作家钦佩地写道,他们“不喝酒,日复一日的工作,要求的不多,非常听话”。) www.csuchen.de/

Already, Russian politicians exploit the “yellow peril” fear. New federal rules limiting the role of non-Russians in retail markets, aimed at Caucasians in European Russia, will hit Chinese markets in the Far East too. But outsiders should not take heart: if warm Sino-Russian relations raise eyebrows in some quarters, a big falling out could be far be more troubling. www.csuchen.de/

俄罗斯的政治家们已经开始利用对“黄祸”的恐惧。针对俄罗斯欧洲部分高加索人新制定的联邦法律限制非俄罗斯人在零售市场的作用,这些法律也将给远东地区的中国市场造成影响。但外界对中俄长期友好并不乐观:如果关系良好的中俄关系在一些领域出现个把小问题,小题大做只能带来更大麻烦。
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