SEPT. 26 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — China said that it would build a network of 11 guard posts and one border guard training camp on the Tajikistan-Afghanistan border, a physical statement of its growing power and influence in Central Asia.
This is the biggest investment yet in Central Asia’s security by China. Earlier in the year it said it would build one guard post on the 1,345km border. Tajik soldiers will man the guard posts.
Raffaello Pantucci, an analyst at the RUSI think tank in London said that China was increasingly worried about Central Asia’s porous borders and especially the threat from Afghanistan were Uyghur separatist fighters have become allied to the Taliban.
“This is interesting because this is not a border with China. They are worried about Afghan security and how security affects China, especially the Uyghurs,” he said.
China has increasingly imposed itself on Central Asia, funding major infrastructure projects, building gas pipelines and buying up metals and energy companies but, other than war games through the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO), which China heads with Russia, it has always avoided a direct military link.
Its soldiers will not patrol the Tajikistan-Afghanistan border once the guard posts are built but it still embeds China deeper into the military psyche of Central Asian states.
When NATO withdrew from Afghanistan, the West pulled out of Central Asia. Russia has, in contrast, invested in its bases in Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan.
Mr Pantucci, the RUSI analyst, said China’s move was not meant as a challenge to Russia in Central Asia.
“I don’t think the Chinese would be doing anything in Central Asia without the tacit support of the Russians,” he said.
ENDS
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(News report from Issue No. 298, published on Sept. 30 2016)
