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China moves in to the neighborhood, Afghanistan
Top China official visits Afghanistan, signs security dealSun Sep 23, 2012 8:11am BST
(Reuters) - China has signed security and economic agreements with Afghanistan during a rare trip to Kabul by a top Chinese official, in deals seen aimed at bolstering Beijing's influence ahead of a NATO withdrawal of most combat forces by 2014.
Zhou Yongkang, China's domestic security chief and a member of the ruling Communist Party's central Politburo, made an unannounced visit to the Afghan capital late on Saturday, holding talks with Afghan President Hamid Karzai at his garden palace.
Zhou's visit was the first to Afghanistan by a senior Chinese leader since 1966 and followed a visit by Karzai to Beijing in June when both countries agreed to cooperate on combating extremism in the region.
(Reuters) - China has signed security and economic agreements with Afghanistan during a rare trip to Kabul by a top Chinese official, in deals seen aimed at bolstering Beijing's influence ahead of a NATO withdrawal of most combat forces by 2014.
Zhou Yongkang, China's domestic security chief and a member of the ruling Communist Party's central Politburo, made an unannounced visit to the Afghan capital late on Saturday, holding talks with Afghan President Hamid Karzai at his garden palace.
Zhou's visit was the first to Afghanistan by a senior Chinese leader since 1966 and followed a visit by Karzai to Beijing in June when both countries agreed to cooperate on combating extremism in the region.
...Resource-hungry China, which has a small border with Afghanistan in the country's mountainous north-eastern corridor, is keen to invest in Afghan resource deposits worth as much as $1 trillion, based on U.S. Pentagon estimates.
Chinese state-owned miner China Metallurgical Group (MCC) operates the $3 billion Aynak copper mine in eastern Logar province, which has been subject to rocket attacks and other raids by insurgent groups looking to disrupt operations.
MCC won the contract to develop Aynak in 2008 and it was originally scheduled to begin production in 2013, but work has been delayed by the discovery of a huge and significant archaeological site in the area...
http://uk.reuters.com/article/2012/09/23/us-afghanistan-china-idUKBRE88M02C20120923
