CPEC: Uniting Regions

“Gwadar Port Operational for Trade Activities” a headline which marked the realization of the long sought dream of President Xi Jinping. It indeed proved that Sino-Pakistan relationship is without a doubt, higher than the mountains and deeper than oceans. CPEC is a channel for the Maritime Silk Route that connects around three billion people in Asia, Africa and Europe. As expressed by President Xi Jinping, “The China-Pakistan Economic Corridor is so precisely situated that it magically connects Silk Road Economic Belt and the 21st Century Maritime Silk Road.”

Although there are various dimensions to look at CPEC, the existing narrative explores that CPEC has provided Pakistan with a distinct advantage. However, in China, the project of CEPC is a silk route road channel connecting different regions and countries in one string. For the world, CPEC is known as the game changer for the worldwide trade.

Three major powers, US, Japan and India, appear to be excessively uneasy as they see the venture coming to fruition. The US is taking a uneasy gander at the CPEC which is as an early indication of the start of the end of its worldwide hegemonic rule at the monetary front. Japan is stressed that with the consummation of CPEC, any modest edge that it had over China in world markets, would essentially vanish because the physical distance amongst China and its trading countries would be abbreviated by as much as 9,000 km. Japan’s cost of creating exportable surpluses as an outcome will be deeply impacted.

India, however, is stressed for the security of its oil supplies that can be choked via Gwadar passing Strait of Hormuz. New Delhi fears that, china might set up a naval base at the entrepôt of CPEC. India appears to be additionally worried about the eventual fate of Chahbhar port, that it is working on with the Iranians lying along the Strait of Hormuz and also around 72 km away from Gwadar, for which India is generously contributing $20 billion. India intended to deny Pakistan the big markets of Afghanistan and CARS region via Chabahar. The success and natural location of Gwadar puts all these plans into a dustbin.



Although U.S. and Japan appear to be occupied with the rising China in a power struggle for dominance in South-China sea, India seems to have as of now settled a stratagem, trying to contain the self-professed dangers to its territory exuding from CPEC. Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi has already made his intention clear on August 15, 2016 at Lal Qila, by vowing to incite insurgency in Balochistan, believing that instability in the area would make it unthinkable for the CPEC venture to take off.

New Delhi is likewise questioning the corridor going through Gilgit-Baltistan saying any happening in the disputed area can not take place without its consent. India fears that China would set up its army installation in GB with the help of Pakistan making it twice as dangerous for India to control IOK.

Similarly, New Delhi fears that once CPEC project starts to roll, it would reduce the efficiency of Chabahar port, oil supplies of India coming from Iraq, Iran and Saudi Arabia would turn out to be reliant on the goodwill of Pakistan and China. Along with these, India’s plans for reaching out to Central Asian markets would be smoke screened as China would have the capacity to make an entrance in the Central Asian states via Gwadar in the shortest possible time, whereas India would be left with its circuitous course experiencing Afghanistan which is still in the grasp of an unending war.

As indicated by Ashfaque H. Khan, the CPEC can possibly change Pakistan into a regional center for trade and give Pakistan a unique chance to strengthen and uplift its strategic and economic position in the world.

The CPEC has aberrant key ramifications as new focuses of monetary cooperation would develop. The Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India (TAPI) gas pipeline was commenced in December and CASA-1000 in May. The Iran-Pakistan (IP) is in progress. China has conferred US$ 2.5 billion to Pakistan to finish the IP gas project as soon as sanctions were lifted from Iran.

All these three energy matrices are intense expansion to the energy dealing projects under the CPEC as it gives another shape to Pakistan as a regional energy network supplier between Central Asia and South Asia. Afghanistan being an integral part of these understandings ensures maintainability of these assertion. In these unique circumstances, the CPEC has been accomplishing its desired results and moving ahead with a quick pace.