China's Belt and Road Initiative and China Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) Five years On.

Byline: Asif Amin and Bushra Amin

2018 marks five years of China's Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) which commenced in 2013 during President Xi Jinping's separate visits to Kazakhstan and Indonesia. Since then, the BRI has become a centerpiece of China's foreign policy. This endeavor consists of an array with five key components, namely infrastructure development, strengthening political cooperation, uninterrupted trade ties, financial integration and people-to-people exchanges.

The BRI is an ambitious initiative to revive the ancient Silk Road Economic Belt (SREB) across Eurasia and the Maritime Silk Road (MSR) across South East Asia, the Indian Ocean, the Middle East and Africa. According to various estimates, it covers two thirds of the world's population. It also covers six corridors spanning across Asia, Europe and Africa. For instance, the China Pakistan Economic corridor (CPEC) which is the most prominent and the also the pilot project of the BRI. The other corridors are as follows: Bangladesh-China-IndiaMyanmar, China-Indochina Peninsula, China-Central AsiaWest Asia, the New Eurasia Land Bridge and the China-MongoliaRussia. Most notably, it is an outward approach when most of the western world is looking inward. It may be asked, why has the BRI become a cornerstone of China's foreign policy? Why is China so committed to invest trillions of dollars for this grand strategy?

The significance of BRI needs to be understood in the context of President Xi's "China Dream" that is a rejuvenation of a China that is prosperous and well engaged with international society.

In this respect, Xi's ideology is to make China a great power and global economic leader. In the first decade of the twenty-first century many scholars argued that the 21st century will be an Asian century; a grand strategy like BRI can really prove that it is Asia's century. It may be argued that even if the BRI succeeds to a small extent, it could draw the wider region into a virtuous cycle of trade and prosperity. Over the past five years, the BRI has started to become a reality. During these five years, numerous infrastructure development projects - for example the construction of high speed railways and roads for connectivity - have been initiated in countries along BRI routes. Since the start of BRI, several hundred cargo trains have made trips to different cities in Europe. Under BRI, China and Thailand have jointly initiated a high-speed railway project from Bangkok to...

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