Sunday, August 15, 2010

Beijing - Central Asia Express ...delayed

RICHARD WEITZ of the Center for Political-Military Analysis at the Hudson Institute analyzes the attractiveness of the Central Asian countries as sources of raw material, export markets, investment opportunities and conduits for trade for China stating that China could reap significant benefits although this would require significant investments to upgrade the region's railroad transportation infrastructure. In a China Brief article for Jamestown Foundation, "Afghanistan in China's Emerging Eurasian Transport Corridor", he concludes that various barriers such as suboptimal legal, policy and communications framework, and transnational threats such as narco-terrorism combined with obstacles around ownership, and financing in Central Asia to limit the effectiveness of a potential Eurasian rail network as an alternative for China to containerized cargo shipping by sea through the Indian Ocean.

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