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Emil Avdaliani

Over the past year, the US has moved to expand cooperation with Central Asian countries on critical minerals. This is being done in an effort to limit China’s chokehold on the resources that are critical to a range of industries where Beijing and Washington are locked in competition.
Yet, the United States is lagging behind China in Central Asia. Beijing has long developed an efficient strategy to position itself as a dominant actor in the region’s critical minerals sector. Uzbekistan is a key focus of this engagement. In late July, the Association of Chinese Entrepreneurs in Uzbekistan proposed the establishment of a US$500 million investment fund to develop the country’s green minerals potential.
In early August, state-owned China National Gold Group reached an agreement with Uzbekistan to expand cooperation in geological exploration in promising areas for precious metals and critical minerals.
The Central Asian state boasts vast resources of minerals and metals, including copper. In 2024, China’s Limaomaoli Metal Company began building a mining complex in Tashkent which aims to produce 2.4 million tons of ore. Chinese companies also invested in other projects in Uzbekistan, such as a non-ferrous metal plant and a copper mining and processing facility, while a US$2.7 billion copper and silver development project has been proposed.
Chinese involvement in Uzbekistan is also part of an effort to sideline non-regional actors. Among the main importers of Uzbekistan’s copper and iron ore are the Netherlands and Turkey, while France is interested in developing uranium with Tashkent.


China doesn’t just have its eye on Uzbekistan, however. Taking a region-wide perspective allows Beijing to quickly tap emerging opportunities in all five countries and adapt to each country’s strategic needs.
For instance, in late 2024, Tajikistan announced the discovery of 15 major deposits of rare earths. In mid-2025, the authorities announced that rare earth metals – niobium and tantalum – have been discovered in the Rasht Valley. Given the fact that Chinese companies hold most of the mining permits for critical minerals in Tajikistan, they are well placed to develop the new deposits.
In Kyrgyzstan, China’s Zijin Mining Group is already a major player in the gold sector. But Bishkek is also becoming open to other mining activity, including for uranium. Early this year, Kyrgyzstan concluded negotiations with a Chinese enterprise for the extraction of rare earth metals from the Kutessay deposit; Beijing and Bishkek then signed a memorandum of understanding on mineral development.
Geography favours China too. To put it another way, proximity to Central Asia and its trade routes is an advantage the United States does not enjoy. The Middle Corridor, a route between Europe and China that runs through Central Asia, is at long last seeing work on a major expansion – a railway from Uzbekistan to China via mountainous Kyrgyzstan – after the war in Ukraine started. Chinese investment also outpaces that of Western countries when it comes to building a port on Georgia’s Black Sea coast.




But the Middle Corridor faces another set of uncertainties. If the active phase ends in the war in Ukraine, global shipping companies can be expected to once again throw their support behind the northern route, which mainly passes through Russia.
China has other advantages, though. Given that mineral extraction is very energy-consuming and the necessary infrastructure in Central Asia remains inadequate, the US won’t be able to quickly expand extraction in the region. On the other hand, China is seeking to improve energy grids across Central Asia. Moreover, China also dominates critical minerals processing, which is more crucial to the supply chain than mere extraction.
For China, investment in the mineral sector is also part of a wider pivot westward, an effort to limit dependence on sea trade, which has increasingly become unstable. Indeed, intermittent security threats emanating from the Houthis in Yemen, coupled with the uncertainties around the war in Ukraine, make the land route to and through Central Asia an attractive geographic bridge.
Moreover, the exacerbating competition between the United States and China is pushing the latter to seek new commercial routes where American influence is less palpable – the Malacca dilemma still remains a challenge for Chinese policymakers. Hence the focus on Central Asia.


Here, it is not only the prospect of US engagement that pushes China to act. Facing Chinese competition in the electric vehicle market, the European Union is actively seeking new sources of critical minerals to be less dependent on China. Central Asia has become a focal point for Brussels and European national capitals.
This year’s EU-Central Asia summit is a testament to Europe’s growing interest in the region’s critical minerals. During the gathering, Kazakh President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev said that Kazakhstan produces 19 of the 34 raw materials needed by the EU, while his Uzbek counterpart, Shavkat Mirziyoyev, promised to strengthen cooperation between his country and the bloc in the development of critical mineral resources.
The Central Asian countries’ eagerness to expand their resource extraction capabilities serves as a good basis for both Chinese and US development. Sensing opportunities, leaders of the Central Asian states are open to cooperation with both major powers as a way to hedge against any single country’s excessive influence. Yet it is China that remains the dominant player in the region. Beijing has the cash and the necessary expertise – not only in extraction but also in processing – all backed up by favourable geography.


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Washington’s overtures to the region may only go so far – geographical proximity and capacity for critical mineral processing are advantages the US does not enjoy


Washington’s overtures to the region may only go so far – geographical proximity and capacity for critical mineral processing are advantages the US does not enjoy.


Rare earths

United States

European Union

Ukraine war

Belt and Road Initiative

Kyrgyzstan

Tajikistan

Uzbekistan

Kazakhstan

China National Gold Group

Expresses the views, ideas and conclusions of the author. (Eg. Enough of Crazy Rich Asians, think of crazy poor Hongkongers.)


In race for Central Asia’s rare earths, China is leaving US in the dust

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}Washington’s overtures to the region may only go so far – geographical proximity and capacity for critical mineral processing are advantages the US does not enjoy

Washington’s overtures to the region may only go so far – geographical proximity and capacity for critical mineral processing are advantages the US does not enjoy