How 2 years and Russia’s war in Ukraine shifted China’s relationship with Central Asia
- Xi Jinping visits Kazakhstan and Tajikistan as the region is increasingly looking to Beijing for security and investment guarantees, analyst says
Xi and Mandarin-speaking Kazakh President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev agreed to double their two-way trade “as soon as possible”.
Those commitments included expanding cooperation in oil and gas exploration and production, critical minerals, new energy, scientific and technological innovation, aerospace technology and digital economy trade.
02:25
Xi Jinping and Vladimir Putin hold talks on SCO sidelines in Kazakhstan
In the Tajik capital Dushanbe, Xi announced on Friday the elevation of bilateral ties to “comprehensive strategic cooperative partnership” and awarded his Tajik counterpart Emomali Rahmon a friendship medal for his role in promoting ties with Beijing.
State news agency Xinhua said it was the first time the award had been presented outside China.
“No matter how the international situation changes, China will always be Tajikistan’s trustworthy friend, reliable partner and close brother,” Xi told Rahmon.
“China will remain steadfast in promoting friendship and mutually beneficial cooperation with Tajikistan … continue to unswervingly promote friendly and mutually beneficial cooperation with Tajikistan ... and firmly support Tajikistan’s efforts to safeguard its independence, sovereignty and territorial integrity,” he said according to a Chinese statement.
Xi and Rahmon also attended the inauguration of new parliament and government buildings in Dushanbe, projects that got under way in 2020 with an estimated 1.5 billion yuan (US$206 million) in investment from Beijing.
According to Li Lifan, an expert on Russia and Central Asia at the Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences, Central Asian nations are now tending to turn to Beijing for both investment and security guarantees.
“The Ukraine war has become a turning point in the competition between China and Russia, with a decoupling of Central Asia, inadvertently or not, from Moscow,” he said.
“With Russia’s preoccupation with the Ukraine war, there is clearly a surging demand in Central Asia for China to step up and play a greater role to meet the region’s political, economic, and security needs.”
Although Beijing was careful to play down its expanding presence in the region in the light of Moscow’s unease about China’s role in its sphere of influence, Li said it had inevitably dealt a blow to the deepening Sino-Russian ties.
“But with Moscow’s increased asymmetric reliance on Beijing in the midst of their rivalry with the US-led West, Russia may have to live with it at least for now,” he said.
Another mainland-based expert, who spoke on condition of anonymity, also said China’s rapidly rising influence in the region was largely due to a leadership void created by Russia’s own decline in the wake of the Ukraine war.
“Regional countries, particularly Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan, have been severely affected by the war and the secondary sanctions imposed by the US and its allies. It is only natural for them to rely more on China, despite their efforts to avoid jeopardising traditional ties with Moscow,” the expert said.
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Why Russia might be warming to China’s presence in Central Asia
For China, the resources-rich Central Asian nations, in particular Kazakhstan, which shares a long land border with the far-western Xinjiang region, are of growing strategic significance as Beijing is wary of being further alienated in the cold war-style confrontation with Washington.
Li said Beijing and the Central Asian nations may have also been brought closer by their shared deep-seated security concerns about alleged threats from the West of a “colour revolution” – protests in some post-soviet states to usher in liberal democracies.
During his speech at the SCO summit in Astana, Xi called on the countries to “resist external interference”, a message he echoed in Dushanbe with a pledge to “firmly oppose interference in Tajikistan’s internal affairs under any excuse by any external force”.
“Central Asia has long been a battlefield for great power rivalry and for China it is particularly sceptical about Washington’s efforts to court regional countries and make inroads into the region,” he said.
