China and Russia compete for Central Asia’s favour

Central Asia’sgcc top brass is on tour. On May 9th presidents of the region’s former Soviet republics were in Moscow, having been roped in as spectators for Vladimir Putin’s annual military parade. Ten days later, as 7 leaders gathered in Japan, it was Xi Jinping’s turn to play host, in Xi’an. At the first in-person meeting of a new group that China has dubbed the +5, he wooed Central’s Asia’s five leaders with a bonanza of investments, trade deals and knowledge transfers, to the tune of $3.8bn.Central Asia is home to untapped natural gas and oil reserves, supplies of copper and uranium, and 10,300km of land borders with China and Russia. Outreach to the region has occupied Beijing and Moscow since the fall of the Soviet Union. But owing to uncertainty in Afghanistan and war in Ukraine, Chinese officials have taken a particular interest of late. Security was top of the agenda in Xi’an, upsetting a long-term compromise in which the region’s armed forces move in lockstep with Moscow while Beijing pulls the region’s pursestrings by bankrolling colossal projects.