Research On Chinese Citizens' Security Protection In Middle East Countries

China and the Middle East countries have a long history of friendly exchangesamong the people. In recent years, with the implementation of the strategy of "goingglobal" and the proposition of "the Belt and Road" initiative, China’s national interestscontinuously expand outward. More and more Chinese people go abroad, distributedall over the world. The Middle East, the focused area contended by various powerssince ancient times, is still one of the most sensitive areas of politics, economy andmilitary affairs in the world. The security problems of Chinese citizens in the MiddleEast are increasingly complex and serious.Through analyzing the statistics of the security alerts released on ChineseConsular Services website (from June,2006to April30,2015) and interviewing somepeople who ever been to, or still be in the Middle East countries for travelling orworking, the author roughly classify the safety risks faced by Chinese citizens in theMiddle East countries to eight major categories, such as political risks, risks of socialsecurity, risks brought by Chinese citizens’ own illegal behaviors, terrorist attacks,epidemic infectious diseases, emergency accidents, financial frauds and naturaldisasters. Taken together, high political risks, frequent terrorist attacks and complexreligious practice are three major characteristics of security risks in the Middle Eastfaced by Chinese citizens. The Chinese government, enterprises and individualcitizens actively cooperate with each other and take measures to confront the complexsecurity risks existed in the Middle East together. But there are still some problemswhich need to be improved. For example, at the national level, China’s consularprotection mechanism still has some shortcomings. As for Chinese enterprises, theprevious investigations for investments are not enough; their safety awareness is weakand the institutional construction of security protection needs to be improved. At theindividual level, Chinese citizens’ legal consciousness, risk awareness and self-helpability urgently need to be enhanced. Aimed at the above problems, the author putsforward some improvement measures: our country need to further complete theconsular protection mechanism; Chinese enterprises have to carry out deeper previousinvestigations, improve their safety awareness and perfect their safety protectionmechanisms; Chinese citizens should enhance their legal awareness, strengthen theirability to save themselves, actively integrate into the local society, etc.