Neither have many technological assets to offer, but both have a substantial pool of skilled labour.
China is not going to share advanced tech with other countries. That pool of skilled labor is just meaningless.
Wasn't Iran keen to buy the J-10C when the UN arms embargo expired but China was hesitant to sell? Why would Iran buy things like tanks and artillery from China if they have their own arms industry?
Iran doesn't import cars like certain other countries in the region, but they assemble foreign designs and put their local badge on it. They've continued building cars based on French designs but have started introducing Chinese ones as well. Russia can't build its own cars apparently. Iran can.
listed to yourself. China has the cars available and Iran just wants to wait for western products or Shan-zhai Chinese products. That's how it's always been. Iran gets Chinese design helps and then produce it for themselves.
How much economic benefits is in this relationship?
In the poll I linked they didn't have a very positive view of France either. I'm sure the UK isn't very popular as well. Usually Germany is very respected. Surprisingly, Chinese aren't that different and also still have a very high view of Germany. People are very slow to learn
How can you be surprised that there's a pro China and a pro western faction? That's the case in many countries. Even European allies of the US have pro Russia parties in their parliaments. They can be very loud, but they're not representative. The West has already demonstrated to Iran that it's unreliable by breaking the nuclear deal. In response, Iran signed the comprehensive strategic partnership with China. So now China has the opportunity to demonstrate that it is a reliable partner unlike the West. The approach that you're advocating would make Iranians see China as equally unreliable as Europe. I guess that's what you would do to empower the liberals in Iran who've lost so much power since the failure of the nuclear deal. If both pro West and pro East factions fail, the state may fail when the supreme leader dies and he's old and frail. Instability is unpredictable and bad for everyone. Chaos in Iraq has already damaged the whole region
nah, Europe gave them the complete finger. China can just have regular commerce with Iran and that's it.
There is no real pro-western factions in GCC countries or Russia or Pakistan to the degree you see in Iran.
Why does China need to demonstrate anything to Iran?
I don't get why you are so into helping Iran? Decades of sanctions have not killed off the pro-western faction of Iran. Decades of normal commerce has not allowed Chinese companies to dominate Iran's machinery import sector (like what we've seen in Russia in less than 1 year). And the 25 year agreement, which was made upon the assumption of JCPOA, got attacked by the liberal faction of Iran despite the fact that nobody else is offering anything to Iran.
It's amazing. Iran has not friend anywhere. China tries to be its friend and just get attacked inside Iran. With that kind of lack of appreciation, what's the point?
Just have regular commercial relationship with Iran that doesn't get yourself sanctioned.
Before the new cold war, there wasn't much closeness. But I believe things are changing now. China obeys western sanctions because western markets and technology are still very important. But now that China is getting sanctioned anyway, it might as well break all the sanctions against Russia, Iran and North Korea and others. So a new golden age in relations should be upon us. The dual circulation in the Chinese economy could be more than domestic Vs international trade. It could be trade with the world including sanctioned countries Vs trade with the west.
Again, be very careful about comparing Iran to Russia & NK. China has mutual defense agreement with NK and is in de facto alliance with Russia.
