Reviving Silk Road
Theancient
Known as the “One Belt, One Road” (OBOR) initiative, it consists two commercial routes following the ancient Silk Road – one on land and one on sea. The land belt is known as the Silk Road Economic Belt, and it stretches all the way from the Chinese city of Xi’an to Italy through Central Asia and the Middle East. The sea belt is known as the 21st Century Maritime Silk Road, and it aims to connect the port city of Fuzhou to Europe via Southeast Asia, India and Africa.
According to the Asian Development Bank, the infrastructure proposed for this project involves 60 countries and eight trillion dollars of investment. A huge amount will be partly financed by the recentlycreated Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank in which China holds the biggest stake.
As in two millennia ago, the routes of Inner Mongolia and Xinjiang will be key points. This time, it would not be the camels riding the Silk Road, but highspeed trains and modern trucks.
Western Economic Zone
‘ We have Shenzhen in southern China, and now Kashgar in the west’ are the words of a faded wall panel in Kashgar, referring to the new Special Economic Zone that Beijing has established to attract new investment. The plan is to grant subsidies and tax exemption to companies who choose to establish themselves here. Cheap labour also abounds in the west, in stark contrast with the continuous wage hikes in the highly-developed east coast of China. The same strategy was used to transform the small fishing village of Shenzhen into the economic powerhouse that it is today – all in just over 20 years.
“The Chinese government is well aware of the socioeconomic disparities that the 35 years of development, reform and opening up of policies have created,” explains Xu Anqi, Professor of Sociology at Shanghai’s
As in ancient times, Kashgar will be a key point along the Silk Road, except this time it would not be camels but high-speed trains
Resident Ehmed Rahshid agrees. Newly relocated, he claims that the living conditions of his family have substantially improved. “Before, we did not even have in-house toilets or running water. Now it is all much more comfortable,” he says. Rahshid has made efforts to make sure that his new concrete home looks like the one before that was made of mud. “Because more tourists come now, our income has increased,” he adds.
Preserving the Uyghur Culture
Indeed, the new buildings keep their ochre façade, with some even using the original hardware on doors, windows and balconies. At a distance it is hard to tell the difference, but up close it is clear that workers are not craftsmen, and the details vary from the old buildings. In fact, the new streets bear little resemblance to the ancient ones, which can still be visited near Donghu Lake.
There, Arzu is one of the few residents refusing to leave his mud home. “The Chinese want to turn this into a theme park, something they’ve already done with other ancient cities across the country. They even charge tourists to enter, as if we were specimens in a zoo. Some are happy about the extra income, but I refuse to allow a place where my ancestors have lived to become a huge shopping mall where local residents have to flee. This is the best remaining example of our culture, and I think we should preserve it, not destroy it.”
Arzu is not the only unhappy one. Outside of China, the OBOR initiative has received its fair share of criticism. Experts consulted by the Society for Threatened Peoples have even casted doubt on the accuracy of the technical reasons given by the authorities.
“In Kashgar, earthquakes have occurred for centuries, the last one being in 2004. No building from the old town has ever collapsed. In addition, mud allows houses to remain cool in the summer and warm in the winter. They are of a much higher quality than those made of bricks and mortar,” says Wu Dianting, Professor of Geography at Peking University.