Security issues vital to 'Belt and Road' initiative

During a two-day international meeting in Beijing, former state leaders, diplomats and experts agreed that security issues are vital to the "Belt and Road" initiative and thus must be addressed carefully.

Chinese President Xi Jinping proposed the Belt and Road initiative in 2013, and the concept has gained significant traction since then. Scholars have cautioned, however, that security issues are vital to the initiative since it will affect vast expanses of several regions, including some of the world's most volatile countries.

During a nongovernmental forum under the Conference on Interaction and Confidence-Building Measures in Asia, which addresses security issues in Asia, a number of scholars also voiced their concerns about these security issues.

Li Fenglin, former Chinese ambassador to Russia and now the director of the Institute of Euro-Asian Social Development Research under the Development Research Center of the State Council, said at the roundtable meeting dedicated to the Belt and Road initiative that security issues posed the greatest challenge for actualizing the initiative.

The former ambassador noted that Asia is the only region of the world where an expansive security organization has yet to emerge, but he argued that CICA can make up for this shortcoming. "'One Belt and One Road' and the CICA can be complementary to each other in this sense and become twin engines in the processes of promoting peace, stability and economic development in Asia and building the Asian community," Li added.

Xing Guangcheng, director of the Research Center for Chinese Borderland History and Geography under the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, said that both traditional and nontraditional security threats are increasing in Asia and may jeopardize the implementation of the initiative.

The area is simmering with territorial disputes, religious extremism, terrorism, and organized crime. "When the initiative is being rolled out, we should not expect to see cases where a single country is safe while the others are not, let alone cases where one country maintains its own security at the expense of other countries' security," Xing said.

While scholars cautioned that security issues might compromise the initiative, they also agreed that the realization of the vision will boost peace in the region, as development will be a boon to security.

M. Akram Zaki, a veteran politician and Pakistan's former ambassador to China, noted in his speech that the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor, which is part of the Belt and Road and focuses on the two countries' cooperation in the transportation and energy sectors, will help his country better cope with security threats. "It will enable Pakistan to tackle its crisis," he said.

Former President of Afghanistan Hamid Karzai also indicated that he is convinced that the Belt and Road initiative will safeguard security in theinvolved region.

"The renewal and promotion of the initiative will unleash unprecedented force for regional cooperation and integration … Its realization will undoubtedly have immense dividends for regional and global peace and prosperity," Karzai asserted.