Vladislav Inozemtsev: Putin Is Waking Up From Chinese Pipe Dream

Vladimir Putin arrived in Beijing with the idea of breathing life into flagging Russia-China economic cooperation. However, analysis coming from both Russian and Chinese sources suggest that his hopes are likely to go largely unfilled.

For example, Vladislav Inozemtsev*, a Berthold-Beitz fellow with the DGAP in Berlin submitted an op-ed to the Moscow Times that in one paragraph sums up just badly off track Putin’s China plans seem to have gone. It says:

“Today, China's foreign direct investments (FDI) in Kazakhstan are 10.5 times greater than those channeled to Russia — and there is little doubt that the "great transit game" Putin relied heavily on has been lost by Moscow. All other pipe dreams, like the one that was connected with the Northern Sea passage, have crumbled as well: In 2014, transit cargo traffic in the Far North went down by 76 percent and is now 4,000 times smaller than what passes through the Suez.”

Inozemtsev concludes his op-ed with the following intriguing question: “Where can he [Putin] turn next? This is Russian foreign policy's biggest mystery, the one that will be crucial after pipe dreams about a possible great Russian-Chinese alliance finally fizzle out.”

ukrainebusiness.com.ua