Paul Goble
Staunton, Feb. 18 – China now has more factories in Uzbekistan than Russia does, and most of those factories are state-owned, thus giving Beijing a powerful lever to influence that country and others in Central Asia on a wide range of issues (gazeta.uz/ru/2025/02/18/foreign-enterprises/ and tazabek.kg/news:2234234).
In Uzbekistan at least, China’s new position reflects both its own expansion of its network of factories and the pulling back by most other countries, including Russia, giving China even more economic leverage there. Not surprisingly, some Central Asians are worried about this trend.
Two examples of this are a Kyrgyz commentary questioning whether Chinese investment in that country will have only the positive influence as Beijing likes to suggest (vb.kg/doc/443006_andrey_belov:_stanyt_li_kitayskie_investicii_chydom_dlia_ekonomiki_kr.html) and speculation in Kazakhstan that Astana and Beijing may soon find themselves in a tariff war (spik.kz/2154-svjazka-kazahstan-kitaj-pod-ugrozoj-torgovyh-vojn.html).
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