China’s Xi meets Central Asian leaders, calls for trade and energy development

BEIJING: Chinese leader Xi Jinping has pledged more rail and other trade links with Central Asia and proposed joint development of oil and gas resources at a meeting with the region’s leaders on Friday, underscoring Beijing’s growing influence .

President Biden and other leaders of the Group of Seven major economies met in Japan on the occasion of a two-day China-Central Asia summit in the western city of Xi’an. It reflects Beijing’s efforts to develop trade and security centered on China, which resents U.S. domination of global affairs.

China is making an economic push into Central Asia, including building railways and other trade-related infrastructure through its Belt and Road Initiative. That has rattled Russia, which sees the former Soviet republics as its sphere of influence, but whose government sees the world’s second-largest economy as an important market and source of investment.

“We need to expand economic and trade relations,” Xi said in a speech to the leaders of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan.

The Chinese leader has pledged to increase cross-border trade by developing roads and railways, and has encouraged Chinese trading companies to set up warehouses in Central Asia. He promised to simplify the import process.

Xi Jinping proposed the establishment of a China-Central Asia cooperative partnership to jointly develop oil and gas resources. Beijing wants to speed up construction of an additional pipeline to supply Central Asian gas to China’s energy-hungry economy and promote nuclear power, he said.

Xi pledged that China would help Central Asian governments strengthen security and defense and fight terrorism. He pledged to “work together to promote peace” in Afghanistan.

Beijing earlier announced plans for a regional counterterrorism center to train Central Asian security forces.

Xi Jinping’s government sees political Islam as a threat and has been accused of detaining about 1 million people in China’s Muslim-majority northwest in what Beijing says is a campaign to curb extremism.

“We should maintain zero tolerance for the three forces of terrorism, separatism and extremism,” Xi said. (AP)