Abstract
In this paper, we attempt to analyze the China-Russia cooperation within the context of the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). For this end, the prospects for and challenges toward the alignment of the two countries’ Eurasia strategies and the impact of such cooperation on the economics, politics, and security of the region and beyond are examined. Exploring the two nations’ actual and potential points of convergence and divergence, we maintain that China-Russia strategic partnership stands at the center of the BRI’s expansion in Eurasia. Economically, the cooperation aims to boost development in the region by spurring infrastructure, connectivity, and innovation. Politically, it seeks to create a more institutionalized and harmonious regional existence via an economy-driven approach to security to address such threats as extremism, separatism, and terrorism. Therefore, in the long run, we argue that the China-Russia cooperation on the BRI is poised to remake the Eurasian geoeconomic and geopolitical landscape with major implications for regional and global politics.
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Notes
As part of an effort to diversify trade routes traversing the Eurasian landmass, China has recently begun sending test container trains on the Trans-Caspian International Transportation Route (TITR) that runs across China, Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan, Georgia before it reaches Europe.
For example, in July 2016, the EEU signed its first FTA with Vietnam and is currently looking for other new trade opportunities in the ASEAN region.
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Yilmaz (Yao Shifan), S., Changming, L. Remaking Eurasia: the Belt and Road Initiative and China-Russia strategic partnership. Asia Eur J 18, 259–280 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10308-019-00547-1
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10308-019-00547-1