Tajikistan, China’s debts and Rustam Emomali’s responsibility

After the meeting of the Council of Heads of State of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization in Astana, Chinese President Xi Jinping arrived in Tajikistan on a state visit.

Xi Jinping is expected to participate in the opening ceremony of the new government and parliament buildings of Tajikistan. The new parliament and government buildings were constructed with funds from China. In 2017, China allocated 1.5 billion yuan (about 220 million dollars) for the construction of these buildings. The buildings are located in the center of the capital.

During this visit, the Chinese leader and Rahmon will discuss trade, economic, and military-technical cooperation, as well as the unstable situation in Afghanistan and security issues in the region.

Military cooperation between Beijing and Dushanbe has been developing quite rapidly since 2016.

Beijing has been granted rights to reconstruct or build up to 30–40 guard posts on the Tajik side of the border with Afghanistan. At that time, the first military facility was built by the Chinese side in the Murghab district at the intersection of the borders of China, Tajikistan, and Afghanistan. Tajik military personnel are stationed there to monitor the movements of “Islamist militants” on the Afghan side.

Experts note that in addition to millions of dollars in Chinese investments in Tajikistan’s military sector, China is also investing millions of dollars in the mining sector in Tajikistan, including gold and precious stones.

During the trade and investment forum held on June 21 in Dushanbe, Tajikistan and China signed agreements worth over 6 billion somoni (approximately 600 million dollars) for projects, including the construction of a logistics center and the Talco Gold metallurgical plant, aimed at strengthening economic ties between Tajikistan and China.

According to media reports, there are currently agreements on cooperation in the mining industry and logistics between Tajikistan and China worth over 560 million dollars. Additionally, there are more than 500 companies with Chinese capital operating in the republic, and the volume of Chinese investments in Tajikistan’s economy over the past 10 years has exceeded 3.8 billion dollars.

Experts believe that Xi Jinping has several important goals. In particular, he will discuss the transfer of power from Emomali Rahmon to his son Rustam Emomali. They believe that if Rustam comes to power in the country, his responsibility to China will be enormous, as Tajikistan’s debts to China account for about 60 percent of the country’s external debt, and Rustam should consider how to repay these debts.