When China President Xi Jinping visited Kazakhstan in 2013 to launch the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), he viewed the BRI as a “bigger and grander” version of the Marshall Plan, an American initiative that aided in the post-World War II reconstruction of Europe.
Chinese President Xi thought he would establish the Chinese world order and destroy Pax Americana with the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), which he referred to as the “project of the century” since it aimed to connect two-thirds of the world’s population.
It appears that Xi’s BRI dream has soured ten years later. Instead of bringing about a period of worldwide prosperity, countries have experienced economic difficulties after joining the Chinese club. It took ten years for the world to realize that the Belt and Road Initiative was a financing scheme with obtrusive, outrageous fees rather than an aid and development initiative.
Countries like Sri Lanka, Laos, and Pakistan are on the verge of economic catastrophe as a result of the Belt and Road Initiative of China. The BRI story is best understood by using Sri Lanka as a case study. After all, after defaulting on Chinese debts, the island government is the only one in the Indian Ocean to date to turn over a significant asset. It’s interesting to note that Sri Lanka, one of the original backers of the BRI, has also fallen victim to the BRI debt trap. Colombo was compelled to give up a strategic foothold to China at Hambantota, a port on Sri Lanka’s southern coast that China built as part of the BRI project.
There was no significant revenue generated by the port of Hambantota. It’s no surprise that Sri Lanka fell behind on the loan; in order to fix the situation, then-prime minister Ranil Wickremesinghe had to travel to Beijing in 2017. Following the visit, China Merchant Ports, a Chinese-controlled business, acquired an 85% share in the Hambantota International Port Group (HIPG). For 99 years, this Hong Kong-based company was given the authority to run and expand the port. Beijing thereby took control of the port of Hambantota through a private proxy until at least 2116.
Two major tendencies have surfaced as the BRI’s actual predatory nature becomes more apparent: Those nations that have joined the BRI with great fanfare are lining up to exit the grouping entirely, while others are refusing to join. Last week, Brazil became the second BRICS nation to decline to join the BRI, following India. Italy, the sole G7 nation to sign on to the BRI, also pulled out of China’s grandiose infrastructure project earlier in December 2023. Numerous countries in Latin America and Africa are already taking action against the increasing debt-trap situations in their regions.
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China, which is the project’s primary source of funding, is experiencing an unparalleled economic crisis, which is one of the main reasons why the BRI is doing so badly. The Chinese real estate market is under severe challenges.
Despite having 1.4 billion people, experts predict that China has constructed enough homes for 3 billion people. Numerous mega-developments turned into deserted reminders of Beijing’s unquenchable ambition for expansion. A complex of abandoned homes in Shenyang has been occupied by farmers for the purpose of cow grazing.
Beijing is in a precarious situation as the Chinese economy is struggling, its real estate is in ruins, and the Belt and Road Initiative, commonly known as the “New Silk Road,” is faltering. Many China watchers, including Bertil Lintner, are making references to the end of the Chinese century.
The communist ideology, system of government, and economy are fundamentally at the heart of the issue.
China’s cherished project, the Belt and Road Initiative, is a fantasy, and the country has fallen prey to its own hyperbole. a legend that a great quantity of items for trade and commerce were transported from China to Europe along an ancient route known as the Silk Road. In an attempt to think of a substitute for Pax Americana, Xi drew inspiration from the historic Silk Road to develop a contemporary version of it.
The Silk Road of antiquity was a fantasy. Such a road between China and Europe did not exist. A myth-based notion is frequently destined to become a myth as well. A project that is created out of a map is destined to stay on the map, and that is the fate of the Belt and Road Initiative. But for the democratic world, particularly India, that is wonderful news.
