MESOP WATCH REPORT : Afghanistan’s Role In China’s Belt And Road Initiative

By: Chris King* MEMRI REPORT  9.10.2021 

The Biden administration’s aim in withdrawing U.S. troops from Afghanistan was to reset its global strategic priorities. So far, however, it has undermined Washington’s efforts to contain Beijing, as it alleviated pressure on China’s western front and handed over to the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) a very important fulcrum in the heart of Asia.

In the past, the U.S. forces at Manas Air Base in Kyrgyzstan, Khanabad Air Base in Uzbekistan, Kuryab Airport in Tajikistan, and Almaty Airfield in Kazakhstan were like daggers pointed at Russia and China. However, following Russian and Chinese pressure on the four Central Asian states, the U.S. was eventually forced to withdraw from these air bases. Yet the presence of U.S. troops in Afghanistan remained a huge deterrent for China.

Now that the U.S. has lost its presence in Afghanistan to deter China, the CCP has gained a very comfortable strategic space. In fact, Afghanistan, known also as the Crossroads of Asia, is connected to many major countries in Eurasia. Furthermore, its strategic position makes it even more important for the development of China’s flagship project: the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI).

China Needs Influence On Afghanistan To Secure Its Western Xinjiang Province

When Chinese President Xi Jinping unveiled the BRI in 2013, the CCP stressed that Xinjiang and the Fujian province would gain unprecedented development opportunities. Since then, Fujian province, adjacent to Taiwan, has been approved as the core area of the 21st Century Maritime Silk Road, while Xinjiang region has been positioned as the core area of the Silk Road Economic Belt. In fact, three of the six Silk Road Economic Belt routes pass through the Xinjiang region: the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor, the China-Central Asia-West Asia Corridor, and the New Eurasian Land Bridge.

Xinjiang shares history and a nearly 50-mile border with Afghanistan. In the early days of the Soviet Era, Xinjiang, with its long border with the Soviet Union, was an important conduit for Soviet personnel and material support for the CCP, before it took power in 1949. In the middle and late period of the Soviet Union, due to the serious deterioration of Sino-Soviet relations, Xinjiang became the front line of the CCP against the Soviet Union. In that period, Xinjiang became home to bases for training Afghan mujahideen fighters in the 1980s and to two listening posts for monitoring Soviet military movements in Central Asia and Afghanistan.

Xinjiang’s strategic position has always been critical for Beijing. It plays an extremely important role as a barrier to the security and economic development of China’s hinterland, and as a source of raw materials, energy supplies and foreign trade. Furthermore, since 2010, Xinjiang has hosted two special economic zones: one in Kashgar, a heavily Uyghur city in the south, and one in Khorgos, near the border with Kazakhstan. The CCP’s commercial interests in Xinjiang drove China to escalate repression and human rights violations against the Uyghurs with the goal of curbing secessionist ambitions.

However, in order to keep control of Xinjiang, China also needs to control Afghanistan. In the 1990s, the Taliban permitted Uyghur insurgents who formed the East Turkestan Islamic Movement (ETIM) to set up training camps in Afghanistan. After opening diplomatic and economic relations with the Taliban in around 1998, Chinese Ambassador Lu met with then-ruler of Afghanistan Mullah Omar, in Kandahar. During the meeting, Lu asked the Taliban to do their utmost to ensure that there were no armed Uyghur groups in Afghanistan that could threaten China. In exchange for more political and economic relations, the Taliban ensured it would “respect the sovereignty of China, [practice] non-interference in its internal affairs, and not [let] anybody use Afghan territory against the neighboring country.” Taliban co-founder Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar made the same promises to the CCP when he met with Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi in Tianjin, on July 28, 2021.

Since the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan, the CCP has been using economic aid and development projects in exchange for the Taliban’s cooperation, ensuring that the movement stops supporting the Uyghur separatist forces, and in the hope of wiping out ETIM’s foothold on China’s periphery. Ensuring absolute security in Xinjiang is vital, as the region is a central BRI passage from China to Central, West, and South Asia, the Middle East, and Europe.