China-Pakistan Economic Corridor: Status 2020-2021
The complex of challenges associated with the promotion of the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) of the “Belt and Road” Initiative (BRI) in 2020-2021 reflects several levels of challenges, such as global and regional challenges and their impact on BRI; implementation of the second stage of CPEC - the flagship project of the BRI. The presented analysis covers a short period of 2020-2021, which, however, is full of fateful events both in the world and the region that have influenced Chinese Belt and Road projects. They should be attributed to two blocks of challenges: geopolitical/ geo-economic and the CPEC itself. Geopolitical / geo-economic challenges of the BRI: global economic crisis; strengthening of the trade, economic and political confrontation between the United States and China; military and political turbulence in Afghanistan after the signing of the US-Taliban Agreement (Taliban is banned in Russia) in February 2020 on the withdrawal of US/NATO troops. But in the absence of a signed intra-Afghan agreement in 2021, the emergence of a new round of instability in both Afghanistan and the region is worrying. In other words, the destabilization is returning to the western and northwestern sections of the Pakistan border in the immediate vicinity of the western route of the CPEC. The Comprehensive Strategic Partnership Agreement between China and Iran in March 2021 is a fundamentally new stage of the “Belt and Road” Initiative. It confirms the progress of the BRI to the West; that is, Beijing has already used the transport highways of Pakistan, put into operation as part of the first phase of the construction of the CPEC/ The Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement, signed in November 2020 by 15 countries - 10 members of ASEAN, as well as by Australia, China, New Zealand, South Korea and Japan. November 15, 2020 can be considered as a challenge to the economy of Pakistan to a certain extent. CPEC challenges: slowing down the implementation of CPEC projects. This is of a particular concern to Islamabad. In recent years, the authorities have adjusted the security paradigm of Pakistan under the influence of global and regional changes, i.e. special attention is paid not only to the fight against terror, but also to the promotion of intraregional trade is the most important and clearly defined route of the CPEC from North to South. Pakistan plans to extend the CPEC to Central and West Asia as an energy and trade corridor.