China’s Belt and Road Initiative loses its appeal over hidden military ambitions, corruption, and lack of economic results.
China’s $1 trillion global infrastructure investment program just turned 10, and it’s losing its luster.
The Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), touted as a platform for China to build trade and investment links in developing countries, has evolved much in the past decade.
But wariness from countries in recent years has grown, and the program has drawn criticism over issues ranging from saddling partners with unsustainable debt to fueling corruption and labor abuses.
Italy formally pulled out of the initiative in December 2023, striking a blow to the Chinese regime’s aims to expand the initiative beyond low- and middle-income nations. Italy is the only G7 country to have joined the BRI.
The Philippines dropped out a month earlier and said it would seek alternative funding for the $5 billion China had pledged for three rail lines. The country’s transport minister said the decision came after Beijing was non-responsive to funding requests.
Meanwhile, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has become more explicit about its plans to reshape the world. Last month, the CCP touted the BRI’s “leading role” in “accelerating the reform of the global governance system.” The project is also known as “One Belt, One Road.”
Experts have said that the commercial component of the BRI was never the focus. By design, the framework uses infrastructure investments to buy other countries’ political decisions, and economic development has served as a cover for Beijing to advance its global military ambitions.
Yao-Yuan Yeh, professor of international studies at the University of St. Thomas in Houston, told The Epoch Times that the BRI’s initial purpose was to export China’s excess industrial capacity.
“China had thought about this long ago: To have an opportunity to part ways with the capitalist world or the democratic world, China has to strengthen its market,” he said.
By Terri Wu
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