The Impact of the Belt and Road Initiative on Central Asia: Building New Relations in a Reshaped Geopolitical Scenario

Abstract

In Chap. 8, Indeo examines how the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) could influence the foreign policy orientations of Central Asian countries as well as their economic evolution and security issues. Enhanced cooperation between China and Central Asian countries would allow them to balance and contain the Russian project of economic integration. By analyzing and comparing the Eurasian Economic Union and the BRI, it appears that these Sino–Russian initiatives have a clash of geopolitical goals, even if Beijing and Moscow apparently discuss merging them. An evaluation of the potential long-term impact of the Chinese initiative on the changing geopolitical landscape of Central Asia requires an in-depth and continuous analysis focused on the region’s challenging issues, thus representing an added value to understanding the political evolution of the five post-Soviet Central Asian republics.