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Maritime silk route

China - Maritime Silk Road

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contains everything about china's maritime silk road. useful for UPSC aspirants

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Page 1: China - Maritime Silk Road

Maritime silk route

Page 2: China - Maritime Silk Road

What is string of pearls?

Refers to the network of Chinese military and commercial facilities and relationships along

its sea lines of communication, which extend from the Chinese mainland to Port Sudan.

The sea lines run through several major maritime choke points such as the Strait of Mandeb,

the Strait of Malacca, the Strait of Hormuz and the Lombok Strait, as well as other strategic

maritime centres in Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, the Maldives and Somalia.

The term as a geopolitical concept was first used in an internal United States Department of

Defense in 2005. The term has never been used by official Chinese government sources,

although it's often used in the Indian media.

The emergence of the String of Pearls is indicative of China’s growing geopolitical influence

through concerted efforts to increase access to ports and airfields, expand and modernize

military forces, and foster stronger diplomatic relationships with trading partners. The

Chinese government insists that China’s burgeoning naval strategy is entirely peaceful in

nature and designed solely for the protection of regional trade interests.

Maritime Silk Road

In 2013 both leaders of china announced the initiative

o President Xi Jinping’s speech in Indonesian parliament

o PM (Premier) Li Keqiang @ASEAN+China summit in Brunei

Significance of ancient MSR

Chinese silk was a great attraction for the rest of the world

Page 3: China - Maritime Silk Road

Historically envoys from different countries came to establish diplomatic relations with

china, and their Chinese hosts presented them with coloured silk in return. In reality these

polite exchanges were a disguised form of trade, and Chinese silk began to be treated as

symbol of peace and friendship

The MSR developed into a route of envoys for friendship, with far greater significance that

purely mercantile road

Reasons

Economic reasons

o Global financial crisis china’s export driven economy disparity b/w coastal china

& inland china social & political problems

o Hence china needs to develop the 12 hinterland regions

Defusing tension

o Good relations with ASEAN, which are presently bitter due to south china sea

dispute

Countering US + Russia

o US – pivot, TPP, support for democratic transition in Myanmar, security cooperation

with Singapore, the Philippines, Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand and Brunei

o Russia – customs union, Crimea accession

Strategic supply lines

o Strait of Malacca - >80% of china’s imports comes from this route

o Bay of Bengal, Indian ocean – better relations with Myanmar & ASEAN

Rebranding

o All-encompassing reason

o Earlier china’s development of ports, navy etc. was termed as geostrategic by the US

o But now china can justify its strategy in the name of economic development &

explore the unique value and ideas of ancient silk route i.e. common prosperity &

development of all countries in the region

How to implement MSR? ‘2+7’ formula of cooperation

Develop port cities along the silk route

o above the wind region: Indian Ocean

o Below the wind region: Malacca, South China Sea, Java Sea and Far East.

Via these port cities, link Asia and Africa with Chinese hinterland

Consensus on ‘2’ issues

Page 4: China - Maritime Silk Road

o Strategic relation

Strategic relations with “good” neighbors.

Signed strategic partnership agreements with Kyrgyzstan and Turkmenistan.

o Economic cooperation

With chillar countries in Central Asia, China signed preferential trade

agreements, gave them cheap loans.

Heavy investments via Chinese PSUs. Mainly in energy (oil-gas pipelines) and

transport (railway, highway and ports).

Joint infrastructure projects (rail-road-ports)

Even proposed Asian Infrastructural Investment Bank. Its offices will be setup in

the capital cities of various Maritime silk road countries.

‘7’ proposals

o sign China-ASEAN good neighbour treaty

o get maximum benefit from China ASEAN FTA

o Conclude RCEP by 2015. China led Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership

(RCEP) = the FTA between ASEAN and China, Japan, South Korea, India, Australia and

New Zealand); eliminate trade barriers.

o Regional financial cooperation (to prevent subprime/ BoP crisis) – recall that China gave

maximum funding to BRICS Bank’s emergency fund against Fed Tapering.

o Maritime cooperation - Already working on Gwadar (Pak), Hambantota (SriLanka) and

Chittagong (Bangladesh). Proposal for Bangladesh-China-India-Myanmar (BCIM) corridor

o security cooperation

o People to people contact for culture, science and environment.

India’s stand

India is likely to be torn between two competing ideas—one is working together with China

in the maritime domain and the other is the long-standing goal of limiting Beijing’s influence

in the Indian Ocean

India's Look East policy as well as the BIMSTEC Cooperation can also be integrated with the

initiative

Some details released, apr,14

Priority would be 'port construction' in littoral countries & free trade zones (china is already

involved in port projects in gwadar, hambantota, chittagong)

China hopes to coordinate customs, quality supervision, e-commerce