#belt and road initiative bri

[rhk111sblog]

Vietnam's Agricultural Exports to China has already reached Usd 6.2 billion in the first nine Months of 2023 as both Countries vowed to even enhance even more their Military Cooperation and Exchanges. Both Vietnam and China also started allowing Tourist Vehicles to pass thru the Borders of their Countries; A Chinese Carmaker opened it first Electric Vehicle (EV) Factory in Thailand as Thailand asks to speed up the construction of the China-Thailand Railway which will be under China's Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) Program

[workersolidarity]

Photo: CRRC

🇮🇩🇨🇳 INDONESIA LAUNCHES FIRST HIGH-SPEED RAIL IN SOUTHEAST ASIA FUNDED BY CHINA: PART OF BELT & ROAD INITIATIVE (BRI)

Indonesia unveiled the first high-speed railway in Southeast Asia Saturday, a joint-project between Indonesia and China funded at 75% by the Chinese State-owned China Development Bank and the remaining 25% was funded by Private Equity from Indonesian and Chinese shareholders. The Project is part of China's increasingly popular Belt & Road Initiative (BRI).

Though the initial project was projected to cost $6 Billion, some cost overruns mostly from land compensation costs raised the bill by another $1.2 Billion. Though by American and European standards, this would be a relatively small overrun.

The new high-speed railway connects Jakarta, a city of more than 10 million, with Bandung, an educational and technology of 2.5 million, with four stops: Halim, Karawang, Padalarang, Tegalluar.

The train four times daily, with a maximum capacity of 600 passengers and travels at speeds in excess of 350kmh (218mph), and covering a total of 142km (88mi).

The new train cuts the travel time between Jakarta's Halim station and Bandung's Padalarang from roughly 3 hours to just over 30 minutes, a truly stunning improvement for these rapidly growing and developing cities.

The high-speed train's cars are equipped with modern amenities including spacious seating, power outlets, and LCD screens while the ride is smooth, with few bumps.

Though a Western media blitz intended to deligitimize the project in recent weeks, actual Indonesian people's excitement about the project is evident.

“We feel very comfortable on the train. We can see how fast it is going,” said Muhammad Risman, a 48-year-old private employee from Jakarta who was taking the test ride with his wife.

"The seats are nice and spacious. The screens are also easy to see and show us what the route looks like.”

While Indonesian President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo, who also rode on the train for the first time last week, expressed his admiration for the project.

“I had visited the high-speed train project site four times before, but this was the first time I actually rode on it. It was very comfortable, and I didn’t feel the speed of 350 km [per hour] at all, whether I was sitting or walking around,” Jokowi said.

“This is what civilization looks like."

#source

#source2

#source3

[xtruss]

The EU Doesn’t Know How to Not Be a Vassal of the US Anymore

Former Fox News host Tucker Carlson has tried to show Americans how Washington has exploited Western Europe

— Bradley Blankenship | RT | August 22, 2023

(From L to R) US President Joe Biden, Germany's Chancellor Olaf Scholz, Britain's Prime Minister Rishi Sunak and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen at the G7 Leaders' Summit in Hiroshima on May 19, 2023 © Kenny Holston/POOL/AFP

Tucker Carlson, of Fox News fame, recently met with Serbia’s President Aleksandar Vucic in Budapest, Hungary. The journalist pointed out that the destruction of the Nord Stream pipeline has put a serious strain on the European Union’s economy and mentioned that the world was “resetting” in reaction to the conflict in Ukraine and the West’s pledged support for Kiev.

Carlson raises some good issues, and an important one to expand upon is the fact that the EU economy is lagging significantly since the outbreak of the war last year. A June piece by the Financial Times titled ‘Europe has fallen behind America and the gap is growing’ details how the EU is now considerably dependent on the US for its technological, security, and economic needs.

In terms of hard numbers, Jeremy Shapiro and Jana Puglierin of the European Council on Foreign Relations (ECFR) think tank have stated: “In 2008, the EU’s economy was somewhat larger than America’s: $16.2tn versus $14.7tn. By 2022, the US economy had grown to $25tn, whereas the EU and the UK together had only reached $19.8tn. America’s economy is now nearly one-third bigger. It is more than 50 per cent larger than the EU without the UK.”

The article goes on to describe a European Union that is dragging far behind the US and China in terms of quality universities, a less-than-pristine start-up environment, and lacking key benefits from its transatlantic peer – namely cheap energy. The Ukraine conflict has impacted the latter to the point that EU companies are paying three or four times what their American competitors are, with Washington being energy-independent and enjoying great domestic supplies. Meanwhile, energy from Russia is waning, European factories are closing in droves, and industry leaders are worried about the region’s future competitiveness.

The ECFR issued its own report on the matter in April, which is far blunter in describing the situation as a kind of “vassalization.” The summary of that report notes that the Ukraine war has exposed the EU’s key dependencies on the US, that over the course of a decade, the bloc has fallen behind the US in virtually every key metric, that it is deadlocked in disagreement and is looking to Washington for leadership.

The ECFR noted two causes for this situation. Firstly, despite the widely understood decline of the US compared to the rise of China, the transatlantic relationship has been unbalanced in Washington’s favor over the last 15 years since the 2008 financial crisis. The Biden administration is keen to exploit this and assert itself in the face of a disjointed Europe. Secondly, no one in the EU knows what greater strategic autonomy could look like – let alone agree on it if they did. There exists no process to decide the EU’s future in an autonomous way given the current status quo, which means US leadership is necessary.

This paints quite an interesting picture. Many commentators, including myself, have long documented the decline of the US and attributed it to a number of factors: less of an attractive environment for foreign direct investment (FDI), financial instability, corruption, and internal political turmoil. This is, of course, relativized to China, which has seen immense economic growth since the founding of the People’s Republic and particularly over the past four decades. But under the smoke screen of a fumbling America and a growing China, the EU has likewise fallen in stature.

The Western Establishment just gave itself a ‘World Peace and Liberty’ Award! Ursula von der Leyen received the ‘Judicial Equivalent’. The Western Establishment just gave itself a ‘World Peace and Liberty’ Award. Ursula von der Leyen received the ‘Judicial Equivalent of the Nobel Peace Prize’ from Justin Trudeau in a perfect self-congratulatory orgy

As for the two causes noted by the ECFR, they seem to be intertwined. Many of the key issues that have faced the EU, from migration to the banking crisis to Covid-19, have stemmed directly from the non-federal nature of the EU. And the current political crises are a result of Euroskepticism, i.e. a backlash against what is perceived as an overreach from Brussels by some political organizations within the bloc. The EU is a complicated and sometimes cumbersome bureaucracy that is cherished by some, reviled by others, and, under these assumptions, is an impediment to strategic autonomy.

The ECFR essentially argues for the EU and Western European capitals to lean into the transatlantic partnership, but on terms favorable to themselves. This includes creating an independent security architecture within and complimentary to NATO, creating an economic NATO of sorts and even pursuing a European nuclear weapons program. At least the former two are acceptable, as abandoning the US outright would be politically foolish for the EU at this juncture. It certainly needs to develop a transatlantic free-trade agreement that puts an end to American trade protectionism.

However, the obvious point to help diversify the Western European economic portfolio, reduce genuinely problematic dependencies, and fuel growth is for the EU to develop peer-to-peer relations with the Global South. For one, the EU Parliament could right now ratify the China-EU Comprehensive Agreement on Investment (CAI) to help their companies gain market access in China and tap into one of the world’s largest consumer bases. I would also argue, as I’ve done in the past, that the EU and China could cooperate – rather than compete – on the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) in the Global South because of Europe’s historical connections, due to its colonialist past.

What is clear is that the EU needs to diversify and back off from the transatlantic relationship. With much talk about ‘de-risking’, or even ‘de-coupling’, from China, Western Europe has actually gotten into the position where it is strategically dependent on Washington to the point of being outright vassalized. This is a bleak situation for the EU’s growth model and its hopes for strategic autonomy.

— Bradley Blankenship is an American Journalist, Columnist and Political Commentator. He has a syndicated column at CGTN and is a freelance reporter for international news agencies.

[beltandroadportal]

Website: https://eng.yidaiyilu.gov.cn/

The Belt and Road Portal is run by the China Economic Information Service and the State Information Center, under the guidance of China's National Development and Reform Commission and Xinhua News Agency. It is an official website dedicated to promoting Belt and Road cooperation.

Business Email: yidaiyilu@xinhua.org

[duncangabi]

BRI: Debt Trap Diplomacy in the Pacific Region

The substantial volume of planned Chinese lending under the BRI has raised concerns about potential debt sustainability issues in developing countries worldwide. There are accusations of “debt trap” diplomacy, which assert that China intentionally pushes countries into debt problems to gain geopolitical concessions. The case of the Hambantota Port in Sri Lanka serves as an example that has raised…

[ilgiornaledelriccio]

Pechino pronta per Belt and Road Forum: "Il mondo si aspetta la risposta della Cina alle sfide globali".

Il più importante forum dell’anno sul piano economico e geopolitico, con rappresentanti da 140 paesi, è attualmente in corso a Pechino. Il Presidente russo Vladimir Putin è arrivato proprio questa mattina.L’informazione dei canali occidentali tendono a minimizzare l’evento o alla distorsione degli obiettivi e degli intenti del forum, come accaduto negli ultimi dieci anni su tutto ciò che concerne…

[kevinmmiller]

Brokering A Solution: China

However, if the above, and aforementioned ideas surrounding Taiwan, and the five dash line area make you squeamish, perhaps they should. An order to maintain peace, in a part of the world which has drawn in many a United States Presidential Administrati

Photo by Markus Winkler on Pexels.com However, if the above, and aforementioned ideas surrounding Taiwan, and the five dash line area make you squeamish, perhaps they should. An order to maintain peace, in a part of the world which has drawn in many a United States Presidential Administration, and left them out to dry, there must be both sides that can agree to the mechanisms in place. That is…

[defencecapital]

China Completes 10 Years Of $1.4 Trillion BRI Project; Puts South Asia, Barring India & Bhutan, In A Bind

By N. C. Bipindra for EurAsian Times This year marks the tenth year of the People’s Republic of China’s $1.4 trillion Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), Xi Jinping’s ambitious project to connect Asia, Africa, and Europe, a supposed ‘21st century silk road.’ However, the project is viewed with suspicion in view of China’s vision of a China-led world order. The suspicion grew deeper with the…

[pannaginip]

Located 62km north-east of the capital Manila, Daraitan village in Rizal province is home to about 5,700 residents, a majority of whom are members of the Dumagat-Remontado indigenous people who consider vast hectares of the mountain range as part of their ancestral domain.

But the village may soon disappear under the same waters that give it life, once the Philippine government finishes building the Kaliwa Dam – one of 16 flagship infrastructure projects of former president Rodrigo Duterte that is being funded by China.

The new dam is expected to provide Metro Manila with an additional 600 million litres of water daily once it is finished by end-2026. Officials said building the 60m-high reservoir is even more necessary now that the country is starting to feel the impact of the El Nino weather phenomenon.

But it was only in 2021 under Mr Duterte that construction finally broke ground, three years after Manila and Beijing signed the 12 billion peso (S$288 million) loan agreement.

Of the 119 on the list [of flagship projects of the "Build, Build, Build” infrastructure programme], Mr Duterte turned to China to finance 16 big-ticket projects in a bid to cement his legacy by the time his presidency ended in 2022. He embraced Beijing during his term and even downplayed Manila’s claims in the disputed South China Sea in favour of securing loans and grants from China.

Analysts have criticised Mr Duterte’s infrastructure programme as ambitious. Perennial domestic issues like local politics, right-of-way acquisition problems, lack of technology and red tape in bureaucracy led to severe delays in the projects.

The same issues hound the China-funded projects – which come under Beijing’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) to build infrastructure in developing nations – with the problems made more severe by Beijing’s high interest rates in its loan agreements and local backlash due to displacement of residents or potential environmental damage.

Critics say the BRI has been detrimental in the long run to some recipient countries, especially those that have been unable to repay their loans, like Sri Lanka and Zambia.

The Duterte government’s failure to take advantage of its BRI loans was a “missed opportunity” for the Philippines, said infrastructure governance specialist Jerik Cruz, a graduate research fellow at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

The four completed China-funded projects under Mr Duterte were controversial too. But they came to fruition because they had the support of local politicians allied with Mr Duterte and therefore increased his political capital, said Dr Camba.

Tribal leaders said they were not properly consulted regarding the project that threatens their traditional way of life. Environmentalists from the Stop Kaliwa Dam Network also say the project would destroy 126 species of flora and fauna in the Sierra Madre.

The Philippines’ Indigenous Peoples’ Rights Act states that the government must first secure a tribe’s free, prior and informed consent before building on its ancestral lands.

But Ms Clara Dullas, one of the leaders of the Dumagat-Remontado in Rizal, alleged that the Duterte government had either misinformed or pressured other tribe members into giving their consent.

She could not bear to hold grudges, though, noting that the Dumagat-Remontado organisations that eventually agreed to the Kaliwa Dam were each given 80 million pesos, or $1.9 million, in “disturbance” fees.

“The Kaliwa Dam is the reason why our tribe is divided now. There is a crack in our relationships even if we all come from the same family,” said Ms Dullas. “I can’t blame the others because we lack money. I believe there was bribery involved.”

The government requires them to present identification documents, and only those given passes may enter. Mr Dizon said this is to ensure that no unidentified personnel enter the area [close to the construction zone].

“We feel like we are foreigners in our own home because the Chinese and the people in our own government are now preventing us from entering the lands where we grew up,” said tribe leader Renato Ibanez, 48.

Mr Ibanez also accuses the Philippine authorities of harassing tribe members who are vocal against Kaliwa Dam. Some of them have been accused of working with communist rebels, a charge the tribe vehemently denies.

Unlike his predecessor, Mr Marcos is more aggressive in defending Manila’s overlapping claims with Beijing in the South China Sea, but still fosters economic ties with it.

Geopolitical tensions between the two nations and Mr Marcos’ stance towards Beijing are going to dictate the fate of the pending China-funded projects the President inherited from Mr Duterte, said Mr Cruz.

Tribe members said they would be more amenable if Mr Marcos would revisit Japan’s proposed Kaliwa Intake Weir project that Mr Duterte had set aside.

“We like Japan’s proposal. It would not destroy our forests. It would not affect residents here. The Philippines would not be buried in debt,” said Ms Dullas.

This was among the alternatives the Dumagat-Remontados offered during their nine-day march in February 2023, when some 300 members walked 150km from Quezon and Rizal all the way to Manila to protest against the Kaliwa Dam.

But they failed to secure an audience with Mr Marcos. They remain wary of the President’s position on the Kaliwa Dam and other controversial China-funded deals.

“As much as we want to fully pin our hopes on him, we don’t. We’ve learnt from past efforts to trick us, make us believe a project is about to end, only for it to be resurrected again years later,” said Ms Dullas.

2024 Mar. 3

[argyrocratie]

"When I first went to Jamaica in 2012 as a graduate student studying the environmental politics of the Maroons, an Afro-Indigenous community who freed themselves from enslavement in the 18th century and established an autonomous society in the mountainous interior of the island, Chinese overseas development policy seemed irrelevant to my work. Yet as my field research progressed over the following eight years, first as a doctoral student in African diaspora studies and then as a post-doctoral researcher, the impact of Chinese infrastructural development and extractive industry on the Jamaican people and environment became increasingly apparent.

The timing of my field work overlapped with an unprecedented surge in Chinese economic and diplomatic engagement with Jamaica and the Caribbean as a whole.

(...)

It is beyond the scope of this article to detail the political economic dynamics and immense social impact of debt in Jamaica over the last 40 years.4 Suffice it to say that the island became a byword for structural adjustment during this period, with every new loan from the World Bank, or default on payments thereof, coming with International Monetary Fund-mandated austerity.

Health and education were notable casualties of this socio-economic assault. By the start of my field research, Jamaican child mortality had almost doubled over the span of a single decade while completion of primary school dropped from 97% to 73% in the same period. This despite the fact that Jamaica had already repaid more money than it had been lent, with continuing debt servicing accounting for a 106% debt-to-GDP ratio according to the latest World Bank figures.

All this is only a small snapshot of the catastrophic outcomes of debt wielded as a tool of neocolonialism.

With the island’s status as one of the most indebted countries on the planet, Chinese infrastructural development was received with fanfare from Jamaican elites, a possible economic lifeline out of the debt trap.

(...)

Jamaican elites may appreciate that they can pay back debts with land, and that China does not directly require broad policy changes like the structural adjustment conditions of IMF and World Bank loans.

However, even with the above and the fact that the Jamaican debt to China is small compared to that claimed by Western IFIs and private firms, Jamaican politicians are growing increasingly wary of the costs of doing business with China. In November 2019, Prime Minister Andrew Holness announced that Jamaica would no longer borrow from China, a scant seven months after formally joining the BRI.

As usual, most Jamaicans are not privy to the inter-governmental discussions and deals driving these decisions, but their government’s newfound reticence in engaging with China reflects deeper concerns among BRI partners that the initiative is a debt trap.

(...)

Almost two decades of Chinese loans and infrastructure-led development have left Jamaican workers and farmers as precarious and dispossessed as ever. The hard-fought and generational struggle for Jamaican workers’ power (trade unions were instrumental to Jamaica’s independence struggle) has been curtailed and rolled back by China’s transposed sovereignty.

Furthermore, Chinese mining interests appear poised to pick up where their Western counterparts left off in terms of irreversible ecological destruction and threats to indigenous survival. Certainly, Jamaica cannot bear another 50 years of capitalist exploitation and extractive industry.

If there is any hope in turning this dire situation into revolutionary momentum, it will be in Jamaicans making common cause with the Chinese laborers imported to the country. According to China Labor Watch, Chinese workers on overseas BRI projects are often subject to “deceptive job ads, passport retention, wage withholding, physical violence and lack of contracts” to the extent of constituting forced labor and human trafficking.

In fact, at least one Chinese worker in Jamaica has already blown the whistle on such conditions. Unfortunately, as of the time of writing this article, there appears to be no organized effort to make solidaristic alliances among Jamaican workers, Chinese workers, and Maroons. The Maroons are organized as an indigenous community seeking land and sovereign rights, rather than workers seeking class emancipation, and remain locked in a fractious political battle with the Jamaican state toward those ends.

Furthermore, the cultural and language barriers between Jamaicans and imported Chinese workers are significant. Yet both countries have rich revolutionary traditions. If Jamaican labor militancy and Maroon struggle were able to reconcile and align their interests, while cultivating strategic allies among the heavily exploited Chinese workers, a powerful relationship of international solidarity from below could be forged."

...

[rhk111sblog]

Another Chinese Vehicle Company will make Malaysia as their Hub for Exports in South East Asia (SEA) while another Chinese Solar Photo Voltaic Cell Company is investing Usd 380 million to put up a Factory there; Vietnam’s Deputy Minister for Foreign Affairs visited China and said that her Country “Treasures” its ties with China while their President told Xi Jinping himself that Vietnam’s relations with China is their “Top Priority” as a Chinese Company making Smart Electronics will put up a Usd 50 million Factory there

[zvaigzdelasas]

[Nikkei is Private Japanese Media]

China's Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) came at the "right time" for boosting Africa's development, a top African Union (AU) official told Nikkei Asia, as he played down concerns that it was a debt trap for poor countries. Last week, Beijing said it would ramp up the decade-old infrastructure drive to build ports, roads and railways by pushing into the digital realm, as the multibillion-dollar program becomes China's key foreign policy tool for influence in developing nations. Chinese President Xi Jinping's renewed focus on industrialization, agriculture and talent development was also just what the continent needs, said Albert Muchanga, head of trade and industry for the African Union Commission, the AU's Ethiopia-based secretariat.

"China will continue BRI, at the same time there is a complementary effort to support us in those three areas. ... Both came at the right time," Muchanga said in an interview on the sidelines of last week's Turkey-Africa Business and Economic Forum in Istanbul. "Africa was making massive investments in developing infrastructure, connectivity, telecommunication systems as well as energy facilities [when BRI launched] and that helped quite a lot." "We need to start the process of adding value on the continent to push industrialization," added the former Zambian diplomat.[...]

Asked if Western powers were being drawn to Africa in competition with China, Muchanga replied, "Well, they are reacting to it, which is good." He also questioned growing criticism that the BRI's massive infrastructure loans and an opaque structure have saddled some recipient countries with unsustainable debt. Some $76.8 billion worth of Chinese overseas loans were renegotiated or written off between 2020 and 2022, according to U.S. research firm Rhodium Group, compared to $17 billion in the preceding three years. "When you discuss with the scholars from China and other people, I think there's an acknowledgment that if we demonstrate greater transparency, I think some of the allegations that are made may not be well founded," Muchanga said, without elaborating.

AU member nation ministers will gather in November to adopt a critical minerals strategy, the official said, adding that the commission is working on a document for approving its new leaders at a summit scheduled for February. "We are responding to the issue of green transition by coming up with a critical minerals strategy," he said, "but the message is to come and produce at source to contribute to decarbonization."

16 Oct 23

[xtruss]

Washington, Not Beijing, is a Master at Manipulating the 'Trojan Horse 🐎'

— Liu Zhiqin | August 01, 2023

Illustration: Chen Xia/Global Times

The Global Times on Sunday published an opinion piece that argues describing China's cooperation with Italy under the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) as a Trojan horse for "China's entry into the West" pushes the West off the course of globalization. Currently, the paranoia of the US and the West about the BRI is indeed very absurd. Their fear of this initiative has reached a level of dementia and logical confusion that is truly astonishing. This makes us wonder: Why do they think we need to resort to such shoddy methods as placing a "Trojan horse" in our cooperation with Europe or other countries?

The US has been using the "China threat" theory to scare its European allies in order to keep Europe firmly tied to its chariot. Unfortunately, on a continent as vast as Europe, it is difficult to find a single entity that can stand tall instead of being a "puppet" under the protection of the US. Europe constantly calls for "strategic autonomy," but why does it lack any strategic confidence?

The US and the West accusing the BRI of being a "Trojan horse" is not just an "imaginative" idea, but a true confession of their real strategy. If you want to know what the US and the West have done in the past, just look at how they are now accusing China. If you want to know what the US and the West want to do in the future, just look at how they are smearing China's development blueprint.

When the US and the West accuse China of "conducting cyberattacks and surveillance," we know where their expertise lies. When they criticize China for "trampling on human rights," we hear guns on American streets. When they say China doesn't follow the "rules," we find that the US and the West are the ones acting arrogantly according to their own set of rules in the world. Currently, the US and the West are implementing the principle of "opposing anything China supports and supporting anything China opposes." This is how the US and the West have turned themselves into such bizarre entities that are neither fish nor fowl.

Rather than the BRI, the US' Marshall Plan provided to Europe after the end of World War II was the true "Trojan horse."

Since the US infiltrated Europe with the Marshall Plan, it provided Europe with a lifeline and an opportunity for post-war reconstruction and revival. The Marshall Plan easily captured the hearts of Europeans and successfully penetrated the political hubs and power centers of Europe. As a result, Europe's "strategic autonomy" has since disappeared; the motto that "Europe is the Europe of Europeans" has become history; "Let Europeans handle European affairs" is now a wonderful wish.

The US used the Marshall Plan to make Europe an economic vassal of the US and "North Atlantic Terrorist Organization (NATO)" to make Europe a military "proxy" for US strategy. Thus, Europe has become the "base" to implement the US global hegemony. With the Marshall Plan (and a batch of other aid programs) and NATO, the US successfully separated the "head" and "body" of Europe: Europe's "body" remains on the continent, while its "head" has already been transplanted to the American continent.

Unfortunately, Europe has not yet come to its senses. The US "Trojan horse" program in Europe is a "US patent" that can't be duplicated.

The US has not stopped the implementation of the "Trojan horse" program around the world, such as the US-Japan-South Korea cooperation, the AUKUS and the "Indo-Pacific Strategy." In particular, the US military assistance for the island of Taiwan is obviously a more arrogant and blatant "Trojan horse" program. In a word, when the US claims that the China-proposed BRI is a "Trojan horse," the US has already deployed its own Trojan horse plans worldwide, and the false accusations against China are just Washington's usual "camouflage."

The US framing of BRI as a "Trojan horse" may offer a new chance for the world to analyze, study, compare and judge: between BRI and those delicately packaged US cooperation initiatives, which one is the real "Trojan horse" and which is the "Noah's Ark" that saves people from danger? The answer is evident.

— The Author is a Senior fellow from the Chongyang Institute for Financial Studies at the Renmin University of China (RDCY).

[southeastasianists]

Jo is the holder of a newly minted degree in English literature from one of the top universities in Laos. But the 22-year-old, who graduated only weeks ago, says he already feels "hopeless".

Confronted with a barren job market, the Vientiane resident holds no hope of finding work at home, and instead aims to become a cleaner or a fruit picker in Australia. His aspirations are low, but they reflect a hushed disenchantment spreading among his peers; the result of a severe and sustained economic downturn that has ravaged Laos for the past two years.

"Every person in this generation doesn't believe in the government. They want to leave Laos, they don't believe anything the government says," he tells the BBC. "Most of my friends have the same thoughts, but we only talk about it privately. If you say bad things about them in public, I don't know what will happen."

The economic crisis has been caused by a rash programme of government borrowing used to finance Chinese-backed infrastructure projects which has begun to unravel. The crisis shows little sign of easing, with public debt spiralling to unsustainable levels, resulting in government budget cuts, sky-high inflation and record-breaking currency depreciation, leaving many living on the brink in one of South East Asia's poorest countries.

Faced with a dire economic situation, and with the April shooting of activist Anousa "Jack" Luangsuphom underscoring the brutal lengths authorities in the one-party state will go to silence calls for reform, a generation of young Laotians increasingly see their future abroad.

"[Young people] aren't even thinking about change, it's a feeling of how am I going to get out of this country - I'm stuck here, there's no future for me," said Emilie Pradichit, a Lao-French international human rights lawyer and the founder of human rights group Manushya Foundation.

"If you see your country becoming a colony of China, you see a government that is totally corrupt, and you cannot speak up because if you do you might be killed - would you want to stay?"

The 'debt trap'

A sparsely populated, landlocked country of 7.5 million people, Laos is one of the region's poorest and least developed nations. In a bid to transform the largely agrarian society, the past decade has seen the government take on major infrastructure projects, mostly financed by historic ally and neighbour China - itself on a lending spree since 2013 as part of its global infrastructure investment programme, the Belt and Road initiative (BRI).

Laos has built dozens of foreign-financed dams to transform itself into the "battery of South East Asia" as a major exporter of electricity to the region. But oversupply has turned many dams unproductive, and the state electricity company sits in $5bn (£4.1bn) debt. Lacking funds, Laos handed a majority Chinese-owned company a 25-year concession to manage large parts of its power grid in 2021, including control over exports.

Also among the debt-laden megaprojects is the Lao-China railway, connecting Vientiane to southern China. It opened in December 2021 at a cost of $5.9bn (£4.85bn), but saddled the Lao government with $1.9bn in debt. Beijing says the railway has created an "economic corridor", but the numbers just don't add up for some economists, not least because Chinese state-owned companies hold a 70% stake.

"I'm sure people are happy to travel very quickly across Laos, but it's not justified at the cost that was agreed to," economist Jayant Menon, a senior fellow at ISEAS-Yusof Ishak Institute in Singapore, says of the railway.

All of this has added to Laos' ballooning debt, which is now ninth highest globally as a share of its GDP, according to the International Monetary Fund. Around half of that is owed to China, and Laos is now having to borrow more from lenders in the country just to stay afloat.

"Laos is so heavily indebted to China that their negotiating position is compromised," he said. "It's having to borrow just to service the debt. That's the definition of a debt trap."

The Lao government could not be reached for comment. But Mr Menon emphasised that Laos has repeatedly rejected other international lenders in favour of Beijing, perhaps because of a belief within the government that China "will not let another socialist country fail". He added that Beijing was also cautious about letting another BRI country default on its debt after Sri Lanka.

The only thing currently preventing that outcome are repeated Chinese debt deferment agreements - the conditions of which remain highly opaque. This has raised concerns over Beijing's growing sway over Laos. When asked if Laos is at risk of becoming a vassal state, Mr Menon said "that ship has sailed".

He said that the "macro-instability" caused by "massive debt accumulation" has also caused the decline of the Lao currency, the kip, which continues to depreciate to record lows against the US dollar. This has led to a decades-high rise in prices, and nowhere is this being felt more acutely than among ordinary Laotians.

'If I don't fight, I'll die'

"'I have never experienced anything like this year," says Phonxay, a frail looking woman in her 60s, selling household staples at a food market in Vientiane. She said her customers are buying less because "prices go up day to day", adding that August was the most expensive month yet. Her family has had to adapt to survive.

"My family needs to eat more cheaply than ever before. We eat half of what we used to eat," Phonxay says. "But I'll fight until the end. If I don't, I'll die."

But it's young Lao, their futures mortgaged off for the benefit of infrastructure projects offering them few tangible opportunities, that will bear the brunt of the economic crisis for years to come.

"Lao is very good to travel, but not good to live in," says Sen, a 19-year-old working as a receptionist in a hotel in Luang Prabang in northern Laos.

The city is bustling once again, with its Unesco World Heritage Old Quarter of pristine French colonial-era buildings filled with tourists. But Sen says times remain tough: "For normal people like me it's very hard. It's just better than living as a homeless person in India, and maybe just better than North Korea. I'm serious, we're just trying to survive."

He earns just $125 per month at his hotel job, but he doesn't see any point in going to university or applying for government jobs as he'd have to "pay lots of money" to corrupt officials to get anywhere as he has no family connections.

"At the moment, almost every Lao student like myself doesn't want to go to university," he says. "They study Japanese or Korean and then apply to work in factories or farming in those countries."

It's this "sense of discouragement among Lao youth… that needs urgent attention," says Catherine Phuong, the deputy resident representative at the UN Development Programme in Laos. She pointed to the "staggering" NEET (not in education, employment or training) rate of 38.7% among 18-to-24-year olds - by far the highest in South East Asia.

"We're especially concerned in Laos that with the debt situation we are seeing reduced investment in the social sector, including health and education," she told the BBC. "I'm sure you can imagine the impact that will have on this generation, not just in the coming years, but in the next 10 to 20 years."

But with the Lao People's Revolutionary Party, which has ruled the country since 1975, intolerant of dissenting voices, young people have had to turn to social media to air their grievances.

It was in March 2022, as inflation and the cost of living began rising, that Anousa "Jack" Luangsuphom created Kub Kluen Duay Keyboard or "The Power of the Keyboard", one of a growing number of social commentary Facebook pages critical of authorities.

The 25-year-old was drawing tens of thousands of followers when he was attacked at a cafe in Vientiane on April 29. CCTV footage shows a masked man firing a bullet into Jack's face and chest. A police statement days later blamed a business dispute or lover's quarrel. Jack survived the attack, but for his followers, the culprit was obvious.

"I feel really bad that the government would shoot him, that they would try to control us like that," says Jo, the university student in Vientiane, who follows Jack's Facebook page. "Jack is the voice of Lao people, he said things that normal people are afraid to say."

But these calls for reform will only be ignored or suppressed, and few know this better than Shui-Meng Ng - the wife of disappeared Lao civil society advocate Sombath Somphone.

Sombath has not been seen since being detained by police in Vientiane in December 2012, a time when his influence was growing and there was hope of reform.

Speaking to the BBC from her craft shop in downtown Vientiane, the last place she saw her husband the day he was abducted, Shui-Meng said voices like Jack's and Sombath's are squashed because they grow "too big a following" at times when the "Lao political elite are facing difficulties".

"Every time something like [Jack's shooting] happens, you see this," she said, zipping her lips. "People go silent."

[somerabbitholes]

Hey, could you recommend some books/essays/articles on the potential Chinese hegemony-a deep dive into Chinese politics? Thanks a bunch, and have a great day <3

hi! i don't know where you're writing from, so i must warn you that a lot of these involve implications for india.

Fateful Triangle by Tanvi Madan: a history of how US-India relations were shaped by the relationship of either with China during the Cold War; looks into the motivations of all countries involved

Belt and Road by Bruno Macaes: about the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), its economic, strategic, and soft power dimensions and how China sees the project

The Long Game by Vijay Gokhale: specifically about how China negotiates with India; especially insightful because he used to be the ambassador to China. Also see his After Tiananmen, which is about the directions that China took after 1989

China After Mao by Frank Dikotter: charts the reform in China starting in the 1970s; looks into the validity of the idea of "opening up"; looks at how the market works within the society and within the bounds of the Party

The Great Game in the Buddhist Himalayas by Phunchok Stobdan: studies China's and India's operations for strategic dominance in the Himalayas; looks at how the region became such a contentious one

Also just some articles/essays/papers:

China's Expanding Influence in the UN System by Gateway House

Chinese Investments in South Asia by Amit Bhandari

The China Trap by Jessica Chen Weiss

China's Hidden Tech Revolution by Dan Wang

China's Latin American Power Play by Julio Armando Guzman

South Korea's Slow Pivot to China by Amlan Dutta

Hope that helps!

[khalid-albeshri]

In 2024, 750 Chinese companies are working in Saudi Arabia. I will write about some aspects of the business collaboration between China and KSA

China and Saudi Arabia have deepened their collaboration across multiple sectors, driven by Saudi’s Vision 2030 and China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI).

Key Areas of Collaboration:

- Energy: China is a major importer of Saudi oil, and joint ventures like YASREF strengthen their energy ties.

- Infrastructure: Chinese companies, such as CSCEC, are involved in major projects like Neom and railway development.

- Technology: Huawei plays a key role in deploying 5G and advancing AI in Saudi Arabia.

- Manufacturing: Collaboration in industrial zones supports Saudi’s diversification efforts.

- Renewable Energy: Chinese firms are engaged in solar and wind projects.

- Cultural & Tourism: Growing cultural exchanges, tourism, and language programs strengthen ties.

- Defense: Cooperation in arms and military technology is growing, though less publicized.

- Finance: Chinese banks operate in Saudi Arabia, with mutual investments bolstering financial ties.

This partnership supports both nations' economic goals and strengthens their strategic positions.

#KhalidAlbeshri #خالدالبشري