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Li & Bertelsen
routes may open in a few years. Writing to the
Financial Times
on January 16, 2008, Professor Robert
Wade said ―[o]pening the northern route is attractive for reasons of both distance and security.
Shanghai to Rotterdam via the north-east sea route across the top of Russia is almost 1000 miles
shorter than via Suez‖ (Wade, 2008). Wade also noted that China has lately displayed special interest
in keeping good relations with Iceland, a tiny island country in the north Atlantic. The strategic
location of Iceland is believed to play a key role in future maritime transportation in the region.
China is prepared to start shipping containers in the north, and the deep-sea ports of Iceland are
seen as potential port bases (Wade, 2008). Wade‘s writing is illustrative of the attention attracted to
the possibilities of new Arctic shipping routes, especially in the wake of Scott Borgerson‘s widely-
read 2008
Foreign Affairs
article. And much Asian interest in the Arctic is about possible new
shipping routes for destinational shipping for energy and raw materials, but also transit shipping for
exports (Blunden, 2012; Hong, 2012b). However, important challenges to this kind of shipping must
be kept in mind. There is uncertainty over Russian policy, there is a great lack of infrastructure, the
navigational season will remain short, the transit times are unpredictable, and – what is usually
overlooked – the shallow depth of the Bering Strait and some of the other straits of both the
Northern Sea Route and the Northwest Passage exclude very large ships. However, the subtle
pressure from Asian powers over the international status of new Arctic shipping routes indicates a
long-term interest in developing capacity for those passages (Jakobson, 2010; Jakobson & Peng,
2012; Jakobson & Lee, 2013; Lasserre, 2010; Alexeeva & Lasserre, 2012a, 2012b; Hong, 2012a,
2012b; Stokke, 2013; Wright, 2011a, 2011b, 2012; Carmel, 2013).
China Moving Towards the Arctic
For the reasons articulated above, Arctic energy resources and new Arctic shipping routes are of
potential strategic importance to China (Jakobson, 2010; Jakobson & Peng, 2012; Jakobson & Lee,
2013). These new routes, in the view of some China-watchers, could imply ―a seismic shift in world
trade patterns and the nature and form of commercial shipping‖ because of significant distance and
fuel savings, and the polar routes could particularly bring China many imminent benefits:
China is 4000 nautical miles closer to the European Union and the East coast of
North America sailing through the Arctic Ocean, and currently there are no vessel
size restrictions and other regulations unlike in the Suez or Panama Canal. There are
presently no fees for Arctic routes (Spears, 2009:10).
As a late-comer, China has not been a key actor in global and regional initiatives and institutions that
facilitate cooperation among resource importers. Beijing‘s energy diplomacy did not receive much
emphasis in the country‘s overall diplomacy. However, this picture is increasingly becoming
outdated. China is deeply aware of the fact that its domestic energy security for sustaining economic
growth is linked to international energy security. Today, China‘s energy diplomacy has gradually
changed the traditional concept and practice of energy security at the global level, and ―the objective
of greatly expanding the channels for supply of imported energy has become an important task for
China‘s energy strategy‖ (Xu, 2007: 3).