China’s Belt and Road Gets a Central Asian
Boost
By Indra Overland and
Roman Vakulchuk May 03, 2018
As
China reaches out to seize business opportunities, its Belt and Road Initiative
(BRI) has expanded to include everything from ports in the Indian Ocean to
icebreakers traveling the Northern Sea Route. However, BRI is essentially an
attempt to recreate the fabled Silk Road. Central Asia was the heart of the
ancient Silk Road — and Uzbekistan lies at the heart of Central Asia. It is the
region’s most populous country, and the only one that shares borders with all
of the others. Uzbekistan also has the greatest potential for industrial
development, based on its past as host for Soviet technological research and
its large, young labor force.
Under the cantankerous President Islam
Karimov, Uzbekistan was an impediment to the integration of the Central Asian
states, the resuscitation of their economies, and the realization of China’s
BRI. For example, Tajikistan’s largest company and main export earner, the
aluminum smelter Talco, is dependent on the import of ore by rail via
Uzbekistan, which was repeatedly blocked by Karimov. His foreign policy
included meddling in the affairs of neighboring countries, shutting off their
gas supplies, closing border posts and flights, and having herders who followed
stray livestock across the border shot on sight.
When Karimov died in September 2016
after ruling Uzbekistan with an iron fist for 27 years, few people inside or
outside the country knew what to expect. There was no heir apparent or clear
mechanism for selecting a successor, and pundits had long been warning about the
risk of instability following the death of Central Asia’s one-man-show
presidents. Karimov’s once-favorite daughter, Gulnara Karimova, was already
under house arrest for her involvement in large-scale corruption, and it was
feared that a protracted power struggle might ensue.
However, the reins were quickly seized
by Prime Minister Shavkat Mirziyoyev, a figure about whom little was known in
the West. Among the few available pieces of information were unsubstantiated
accounts that he, in a past position as regional governor, personally beat up a
math professor whose students were being used as forced labor in the cotton harvest
and were not picking fast enough. Some therefore expected Mirziyoyev to be a
more energetic and even more brutal version of Karimov, under whom hundreds of
protesters, including women and children, were shot in the town of Andijan in
2005.
Yet Mirziyoyev now increasingly appears
as an Uzbek Deng Xiaoping. He swiftly kickstarted a series of large-scale
reforms, lashed out at corruption, and made unprecedented friendly overtures to
all of Uzbekistan’s estranged neighbors. Initiatives during his first year in
power included currency conversion reform, trade liberalization, improvement of
the business climate, reform of the cotton industry, simplified entry for
foreign nationals, and welcoming the European Bank for Reconstruction and
Development back to Uzbekistan. Along with North Korea, Uzbekistan has been one
of the few countries in the world to maintain an exit visa regime for its own
citizens, but in 2019 this too will be scrapped.
In the first year of his presidency,
Mirziyoyev visited Kazakhstan four times, Turkmenistan three times, and Russia
twice, as well as China, Kyrgyzstan, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, and the United
States. Noteworthy effects of this charm offensive have concerned relations
with neighboring Tajikistan, which Mitziyoyev visited in March. Freight trains
carrying ore for Talco’s aluminum production now roll unhindered through
Uzbekistan; direct passenger flights between the two countries have been
permitted for the first time in 25 years; a 30-day visa-free regime has been
established; and 10 of the 16 border checkpoints that had been closed have been
reopened, with the remainder under discussion.
Given Uzbekistan’s new foreign policy
outlook, solving regional squabbles over shared water resources now appears
more feasible than at any time since the dissolution of the Soviet Union. In
2012, Karimov threatened to go to war over water issues. Above all, he was
opposed to the construction of the 3,600 MW Rogun hydropower dam in Tajikistan,
which the Uzbeks fear could disrupt the supply of water for their main export:
cotton. But in March 2018, Uzbek Foreign Minister Abdulaziz Komilov
unexpectedly declared that Tajikistan could go ahead with the dam, as long as
long as Uzbekistan’s interests were taken into account and it is built in
accordance with the relevant international conventions to which Tajikistan is
party.
Uzbekistan’s newfound openness will
benefit China’s Belt and Road Initiative both directly and indirectly. It will
have a direct positive impact by making it easier and more
secure for the Chinese and others to invest in transport infrastructure
crisscrossing Central Asia. It will have an indirect positive
impact by facilitating economic growth in Central Asia — rendering the Belt and
Road less of a road to nowhere, and more economically meaningful for the
Chinese.
As Central Asia’s Uzbek capstone slides
into place, the Chinese can look forward to reaping the fruits of all that they
have quietly being sowing across the region, including investments in oil, gas,
railways, roads, dry ports, agriculture and the electricity sector. The
currency of Chinese soft-power investments is also likely to rise, including
the 11 Confucius Institutes across Central Asia and the education of 23,000
students from the region at Chinese universities.
Of course, Karimov was not the sole obstacle
to Central Asian integration. It takes five to tango, Central-Asian style, and
most of the other countries in the region frequently engaged in tit-for-tats
with Karimov’s Uzbekistan while their Soviet-trained leaders busied themselves
building national identities to set them apart from their neighbors. However,
when it came to interstate relations, Karimov was the worst of the lot and his
replacement by Mirziyoyev may tip the balance towards greater regional
integration.
The impact on BRI of Uzbekistan’s new
foreign policy stance also does not hinge on the country aligning with China
per se. It is not unlikely that Mirziyoyev — like Karimov before him, and like
Presidents Nursultan Nazarbayev and Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedow in neighboring
Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan — will do everything possible to maintain the
independence of his country from major outside powers. Fears of China (and
especially Chinese migrants), though less palpable than in Kazakhstan and
Kyrgyzstan, are also evident among the Uzbek population. However, although
China behaves intrusively and coercively in contexts like the South China Sea
or the Doklam Plateau, the logic of BRI in Central Asia is one of connectivity,
cooperation, and large-scale investment. All China needs to make BRI work in
Central Asia is open borders and receptivity to Chinese capital.
As yet, Mirziyoyev does not appear set
on any major program of democratization, beyond a slight loosening of the reins
on religion and civil society. Like Deng Xiaoping, his focus appears to be on
the economy, security and foreign affairs. He is certainly no democratic
reformer along the lines of Mikhail Gorbachev. This too should fit Chinese
purposes nicely.
Indra Overland is Research Professor at
the Norwegian Institute of International Affairs (NUPI), Head of the Central
Asia Data-Gathering and Analysis Team (CADGAT) and co-author of “Did China
Bankroll Russia’s Annexation of Crimea” and “A Match Made in
Heaven? Strategic Convergence between China and Russia”.
Roman Vakulchuk is Senior Research
Fellow at NUPI and Visiting Lecturer at the OSCE Academy in Kyrgyzstan. He is a
former Economic Analyst at Central Asia Development Institute (CADI),
consultant for the Asian Development Bank and author of “Public
Administration Reform and Its Implications for Foreign Petroleum Companies in
Kazakhstan.”
No comments:
Post a Comment