Will the China-Kyrgyzstan-Uzbekistan Railway Finally Be Built?

In 2012, Kyrgyzstan’s president called the China-Kyrgyzstan-Uzbekistan railway the “the single most important infrastructure project” for the country. During his tenure as president, Almazbek Atambayev notoriously flipflopped on the railway, which at that juncture had been under discussion for over a decade.

Ten years later, more than two decades after the project was first proposed, discussion around the China-Kyrgyzstan-Uzbekistan (CKU) railway has been revived.

From Kashgar to Andijan By Rail?

Mention of the CKU railroad, according to the Kyrgyz Railway Company, first appeared in 1996. That year, China announced the construction of a rail route from Korla to Kashgar in Xinjiang. In 1997, China, Kyrgyzstan, and Uzbekistan signed a memorandum on the construction of a Kashgar-Osh-Andijan railroad and began theorizing various routes. By 2002, two main routes were under consideration – a northern route, which Kyrgyzstan preferred because it would provide a viable interregional internal rail system, and a southern route, which China preferred. China provided Kyrgyzstan with a technical grant to research the northern route in 2002.

Little else concrete has happened regarding the critical Kyrgyz portion for nearly 20 years.

Kyrgyzstan had myriad concerns back in 2012, many of which have not changed. One major concern was that while the route would generate short-term employment during construction, it would provide less benefit once the railway between China and Uzbekistan, a much larger market, was completed. Kyrgyzstan would be a transit node, not a trading hub. In addition there were concerns over costs, financing, and the environmental impact of the dozens of tunnels that would need to be bored through Kyrgyzstan’s mountainous terrain. Finally, Russia’s frigid view of the project, which cut Moscow out of transit through Central Asia, chilled Kyrgyz enthusiasm.

Although it came up routinely in joint statements between Kyrgyz and Uzbek leaders and their Chinese counterparts over the years, little was done to actualize the vision.

In Uzbekistan, with Chinese funding, a rail line was constructed between Angren and Pop, providing a path from the Fergana Valley to Tashkent without crossing into Tajikistan, as the Soviet-era rail network did. But following the 2016 opening of the Angren-Pop Railway, little more was completed within the China-Kyrgyzstan-Uzbekistan Railway vision.

The route is, in a way, in use already. Trade transits through the region but includes the use of trucks through Kyrgyzstan. The CKU railway is, at present, envisioned as being around 523 kilometers long, with 260 km crossing Kyrgyzstan. BNE Intellinews reported officials as saying it would cut travel time between China and Europe by a week once finished.

A Change in Circumstances

On May 23, Kyrgyz Prime Minister Akylbek Japarov said that he expected a document to be signed at the September summit of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), in Samarkand, Uzbekistan to start construction on the CKU railway.

Uzbek President Shavkat Mrizyoyev, while attending a May 27 virtual meeting of the Eurasian Economic Union, of which Tashkent is just an observer, lauded the CKU railway. He said it would launch in the “near future” and create new opportunities for transport corridors connecting the Central Asian region with the Asia-Pacific.

That Mirziyoyev used the EAEU meeting to heap praise on a Chinese project pointed to the weakening of Russian objections, something confirmed by Kyrgyz President Sadyr Japarov a few days later.

Soon after, Japarov said construction on the CKU route may begin in 2023, following the signing of agreements and the clearing of Russian objections. The Kyrgyz president said he’d spoken with Russian President Vladimir Putin for half an hour at the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) summit in Moscow earlier in May about the railway.

“In the end, [Putin] realized that the railway was very necessary, and said that he did not mind. He said: ‘if you need it, then build it,’” Japarov said of his conversation with the Russian president. In Japarov’s view, if the route is complete Kyrgyzstan will become a transit country: “Jobs will appear. The economy will be boosted.”

The war in Ukraine, or rather its economic repercussions for Russia and its partners, seems to have generated the necessary diplomatic space for Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan to more boldly engage with China on actualizing the CKU. Moscow may nevertheless still have its reservations. The CKU route cuts Russia out of trade and transit in the Central Asian region. But Russia doesn’t have the ability to push or persuade Central Asian leaders not to diversify their options; in fact, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine makes it all the more clear that the region needs more than just Russia.

Can the CKU Be Realized?

In early June, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi visited Central Asia. The CKU railway was mentioned not only in bilateral meetings with Wang’s Kyrgyz and Uzbek counterparts but also in the readout of the larger China+Central Asia (C+C5) meeting. In all three readouts, the desire to “speed up the China-Kyrgyzstan-Uzbekistan Railway project” was mentioned.

All eyes will be on September’s SCO summit in Uzbekistan, scheduled for September 15-16 in Samarkand. If China, Kyrgyzstan, and Uzbekistan are going to move on to the next phase of realizing the CKU vision, that’s when they’ll formally announce it.

But don’t let the hype overwhelm the reality: Much work needs to be done in determining the exact route, conducing feasibility studies, agreeing on what rail gauge to use, calculating the costs (a decade ago it was estimated at around $2 billion), agreeing on financing, and, of course, carrying out the needed construction. While technical challenges loom as large as the political challenges, there are also environmental risks that have seen little high-level discussion, from the seismic risks inherent to the region to the impact of tunneling through Kyrgyzstan's many mountains.