Quote: "It has revolutionized transport and enriched lives in countless states across Africa and Asia ..." and, down the piece this: "More than a decade after the launch of BRI, the project is undoubtedly successful for China. But this success comes at the cost of scores of recipient countries. This weakness has led China’s global competitors, such as the US, to develop their own multi-national projects."
Sound like a contradiction, if not a contradiction in terms. You can't say successful in one breath and questionable success. in another. The fact that BRI is under attack on so many fronts because of the nefarity of Chinese "investment" strategies, manipulation and "control" and or influence exerted on the domestic politics of Chinese investment recipients through the BRI, says BRI is an arm of Chinese foreign policy, to create vassal states to China's foreign policy whims and fancies with a undoubted geopolitical bent. Like it or not China, like the US, is playing great power competition but at the expense of weaker Third World states while largely impoverishing these countries and their people through large-scale exploitation, indebtedness, even lower wages and control of the resource and labor markets in these countries. Some might say this is just the face of Chinese capitalism. Perhaps. But indeed it is the face of world capitalism, and it hasn't changed one bit since European colonialism. What you have here, in the case of China's BRI, is Chinese neo-imperialism, like it or not. Just ask ordinary Sri Lankans, for example.
The phrase "Pakistan owes more than 30 percent of its total external debt – around US$130 billion today – to China" can be interpreted two ways:
Pakistan's total external debt is US$130 billion, of which more than 30% is owed to China.
The amount Pakistan owes to China alone is US$130 billion, and this represents more than 30% of Pakistan's total external debt.
Which is it? Thanks.
Quote: "It has revolutionized transport and enriched lives in countless states across Africa and Asia ..." and, down the piece this: "More than a decade after the launch of BRI, the project is undoubtedly successful for China. But this success comes at the cost of scores of recipient countries. This weakness has led China’s global competitors, such as the US, to develop their own multi-national projects."
Sound like a contradiction, if not a contradiction in terms. You can't say successful in one breath and questionable success. in another. The fact that BRI is under attack on so many fronts because of the nefarity of Chinese "investment" strategies, manipulation and "control" and or influence exerted on the domestic politics of Chinese investment recipients through the BRI, says BRI is an arm of Chinese foreign policy, to create vassal states to China's foreign policy whims and fancies with a undoubted geopolitical bent. Like it or not China, like the US, is playing great power competition but at the expense of weaker Third World states while largely impoverishing these countries and their people through large-scale exploitation, indebtedness, even lower wages and control of the resource and labor markets in these countries. Some might say this is just the face of Chinese capitalism. Perhaps. But indeed it is the face of world capitalism, and it hasn't changed one bit since European colonialism. What you have here, in the case of China's BRI, is Chinese neo-imperialism, like it or not. Just ask ordinary Sri Lankans, for example.