China Voice: Growing peacekeeping efforts manifest China's responsible role

The deployment to South Sudan of China's first infantry battalion to a United Nations peacekeeping mission has once again demonstrated the nation's determination in safeguarding world peace.

A detachment of 130 troops left east China's Shandong Province on Tuesday, completing the deployment of a 700-strong battalion to the war-torn African nation.

The troops will focus on protecting civilians as well as UN personnel and facilities. They will also participate in humanitarian relief and patrol streets.

Previous Chinese peacekeepers were mainly small, specialist units including engineering, transportation, medical and security teams.

Though its size is not outstanding, the battalion is a historic sign of China taking a greater role in safeguarding world peace. It is also symbolic as this April marks the 25th anniversary of China's first UN peacekeeping mission.

In April 1990, the People's Liberation Army sent five military observers to the UN Truce Supervision Organization.

Since then, China has sent over 30,000 peacekeepers to more than 20 UN peacekeeping missions. Ten of them lost their lives on foreign soil.

China has become the largest contributor of peacekeepers among the five permanent members of the UN Security Council.

The manpower is just one aspect of these efforts. China is now the sixth-largest contributor of UN peacekeeping funding among all member states in the UN, and the largest among developing countries.

The increasing contribution is in tandem with China's growing economic strength over the past three decades. The country's GDP in 1990 was about 1.8 trillion yuan (about 290 bln U.S. dollars), while in 2014, the figure had ballooned to 63.6 trillion yuan.

The expanded peacekeeping scale is also a natural result of China's rich experience in peacekeeping accumulated over the last 25 years.

And it should be noted that though it has sent tens of thousands of soldiers overseas to carry out peacekeeping missions, China has always been maintaining its operations under the framework of the UN, which renders claims of threat from China hollow and untenable.

This peacekeeping mission by the infantry battalion is in accordance with the UN Security Council Resolution 2155.

In another sign of good will, China has evacuated not only hundreds of its own nationals but also more than 270 foreign citizens, including 176 Pakistanis, 29 Ethiopians and five Singaporeans, from Yemen recently, aboard vessels of a naval escort fleet patrolling the Gulf of Aden and waters around Somalia.

As a force for peace, the Chinese army offers a helping hand not just to its own citizens.

Currently, China has more than 2,700 peacekeepers posted in the UN's nine mission areas. The number will reach 3,100 by the end of this year.

A founding nation of the UN and one of the nations that endorsed the UN Charter in San Francisco 70 years ago, China will continue to pursue a path of peaceful development and contribute to world peace and regional stability in this age of globalization. Endi