USA utmanar Kinas BRI när handelsspänningarna ökar | NTD NYHETER

The US has opened up for fair trade agreements while China is trying to strengthen its partnerships through infrastructure investment, the so-called Belt and Road Strategy, BRI. The initiative promises trade and financing of infrastructure projects as railways to the countries that join. Recently, China's leader Xi Jinping visited Vietnam, Malaysia and Cambodia, where he signed several similar agreements. The economies of these countries are strongly dependent on exports to the US, but also have extensive trade relations with China. It is worth noting that China's BRI initiative receives a lot of criticism in the West. It is accused of favoring unfair trade, increasing Beijing's communist influence and blaming participating countries in an unsustainable way. The Chinese regime then demands the debts back by taking control of the strategic infrastructure it helped to build. In 2023, Italy withdrew from the BRI cooperation after seeing how the trade exchange in 2019 was sharply reduced to China's advantage. That year, Italy exported goods to China at a value of about $18.6 billion, while imports from China rose to as much as $65 billion. Another example is Panama, which joined the BRI in 2017. Since then, both Chinese investments in infrastructure and trade between the countries have increased. Chinese companies have also increased their presence around the Panama Canal, which has strengthened Beijing's strategic influence in the area. An expert for Centers for Strategic and International Studies warns that the Chinese Communist Party could quickly take control of these ports in the event of a conflict.