China and the Middle Corridor

An important part of China’s external policy has been its relations with its western neighbors in Central Asia. Since 2013, China has actively aligned its interests with the multivector foreign policies of Central Asian states. This synergy, alongside growing demand for China-Europe overland transport, has enabled car the electronics manufacturers to bridge their regional value chains into a unified Eurasian network. The latter situation has become more difficult since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022. China has remained on good terms with Russia without condoning the invasion of an independent country, but this has made it difficult to collaborate in establishing new routes through Central Asia and to Europe, which threaten the future pre-eminence of the Russian routes. This article starts by explaining the demand for rail services to connect regional value chains in East Asia and in Europe and, in the value chain context, the importance of trade costs in terms of time and reliability as well as finance. The rail Landbridge between Europe and China flourished between 2010 and 2022 despite potentially adverse shocks following Russia’s 2014 absorption of Crimea and the 2020–2021 COVID-19 pandemic. The Russian invasion of Ukraine and ensuing sanctions proved more challenging, and traders sought new routes south of Russia and north of Iran, the so-called Middle Corridor. This search was embraced by the European Union and by the Central Asian and South Caucasus countries along the corridor, as well as Türkiye, but China was hesitant in 2022 and 2023. The article asks why China became more embracing of the Middle Corridor in 2024 and 2025 and what the prospects are likely to be.