Carnegie-Tsinghua’s Paul Haenle continued his conversation with Peking University’s Dr. Wang Yizhou, turning to the long term goals of China’s North Korea policy and promising areas for U.S.-China cooperation. Wang described the evolution of the China-DPRK relationship as inevitable, adding that Beijing’s current goal on the Korean Peninsula is complete denuclearization. However, he emphasized that China’s leadership still intends to protect the North Korean state from failure and will strongly oppose military measures by the United States, Japan, or South Korea against the DPRK. Finally, Wang addressed five areas in which the United States and China can build cooperation in the near term, but insisted that long term cooperation will depend on effective crisis management and the success of China’s domestic reforms.

Wang Yizhou

Wang Yizhou is the associate dean of the School of International Studies at Peking University and a professor of International Politics and Chinese Foreign Affairs. He is also a senior research fellow at the Institute of World Economics and Politics at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS) and the editor in chief of World Economics and Politics, a CASS magazine published monthly in Chinese.

Paul Haenle

Paul Haenle is the director of the Carnegie–Tsinghua Center. Prior to joining Carnegie, he served from June 2007 to June 2009 as the director for China, Taiwan, and Mongolian Affairs on the National Security Council staffs of former president George W. Bush and President Barack Obama.