China green lights a game-changing new railway through Central Asia

The 523km line linking China, Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan could eventually be extended to the Middle East, South Asia and Europe

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A China-Europe freight train departs from Tongjiang in the northeastern Chinese province of Heilongjiang. Photo: Xinhua

Published: 8:00pm, 6 Dec 2024

China is finally moving forward with plans to build a new railway to Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan, with analysts saying the project will play an important role in deepening Chinese ties across Central Asia and beyond.

The 523km (325-mile) line – which will connect Kashgar on China’s northwestern frontier with several cities in Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan – had been in limbo for decades, but the project is now officially underway and the first phase could be completed by the end of the decade.

China Railway posted a business tender on its procurement website in late November, stating that the Kyrgyzstan section would have a planned investment of 33.9 billion yuan (US$4.7 billion) and construction was expected to be finished by 2030.

According to analysts, the line is designed to be just the first component in a much wider rail network linking China with countries across Central Asia, the Middle East and Europe.

“The railway has great potential to be extended and serves as a skeleton network for east-west and north-south connections,” said Zhu Yongbiao, a professor in international relations at Lanzhou University. “For example, Uzbekistan’s route can stretch to Pakistan via Afghanistan.”

Connecting lines may also be built to extend the railway to Turkmenistan, Iran and Turkey, said Zhao Long, deputy director of the Institute for Global Governance Studies at the Shanghai Institutes for International Studies.

The China-Kyrgyzstan-Uzbekistan Railway will also offer China a faster – and potentially geopolitically useful – alternative to Trans-Eurasia Logistics, a rail route that connects China to Europe via Russia.