Against the prevailing narrative of the The Belt and Road as a top-down strategy to spread China’s geopolitical influence, there is the BRI’s impact through its first decade as emanating «from the middle out and bottom up» via transport-enabled corridors traversing a large number of regions within and across national territories.

Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan are strengthening their economic ties with China through an ambitious railway project linking the three countries along the historical Silk Road