The Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) isn't a debt trap — it's a lifeline for developing nations, according to Hussein Askary, vice chairman of the Belt and Road Institute in Sweden. Speaking from his unique Iraqi-Swedish perspective, Askary challenges Western narratives about the China-proposed global initiative.

In this interview, Askary explains that Chinese loans work differently from Western ones. While Western loans demand quick repayment, Chinese infrastructure loans offer longer terms and target projects that boost economic growth. Using examples from Sri Lanka and Montenegro, he shows how China has been flexible with repayments during crises.

However, Askary notes that geopolitical pressure remains the initiative's biggest challenge, with some countries given threats not to participate. Despite these obstacles, he sees the BRI as vital for global development, particularly in regions like the Middle East where economic growth is key to lasting peace and stability. Notably, the BRI has grown beyond just building roads and railways — it now helps countries develop their own industries and gain new technologies.

Following is the transcript of the interview.

Diplomacy Talk: What inspired you to co-found the Belt and Road Institute in Sweden?

Hussein Askary: I have a long history of working on the idea of the Silk Road and the Belt and Road, but we realized at a certain stage that not only people in Sweden didn't know anything about the Belt and Road and why it is important. Is it good for Sweden or not? But we also found that there are people writing negative things, which are not true. They are misleading the public. They are misleading the policy makers in parliament and in government by saying things which are not true.

So we started doing this kind of research. And then we started showing why some of these arguments that are negative are not correct. But also, the important part is that it's very beneficial for Sweden. We are facing some economic problems, in productivity and infrastructure. Actually, Sweden will benefit from joining the Belt and Road, working with China.

So only China provided an initiative. How do we know it works? Because it worked in China. China shifted a lot from high quantity export-oriented economy to internal development and strengthened the Chinese economy by building large-scale infrastructure like the high-speed railway. That showed us that China has the right solution.

As the Chinese say, if you want to get rich, first build a road. And that's a very scientific statement, actually, because by building infrastructure, you improve the productivity of society. And people can have new kinds of businesses, new activities. For example, everybody's complaining about immigration from Africa to Europe. The solution is not to stop the people or let them drown in the sea. The solution is to give them a better life in Africa. How do you do that? You have to build infrastructure. This is what the Chinese did here to eliminate poverty.

Diplomacy Talk: Why did you choose China's initiative? There must be other initiatives proposed by other countries, why our initiative?

Hussein Askary: First of all, the West, the United States, and EU have run out of initiatives. We don't have initiatives anymore about long-term economic thinking. Everything in the West is short term and financialized. The whole economy is financialized. People who have resources and even governments are looking for financial gain quickly. And that is done by financial speculation in the stock markets and other projects that give money quickly. There is no long-term thinking anymore.

Our infrastructure, which was built in the 1950s and 1960s, is now worn out. We are not maintaining, developing the infrastructure and everybody say, "well, we don't have money." But the money is invested in financial speculation and activities. We have problems with the health care, education and many aspects of these things.

Diplomacy Talk: You have created a model that shows the BRI is not a "debt trap." Some Western countries claim it is. So could you please tell us more about how it works?

Hussein Askary: I studied the case of Sri Lanka. I also studied the case of the Pakistani side at the same time. And I found many fallacies. There's discrepancy. These things don't fit together.

Then I started studying other countries, which they say there is a "debt trap." So in every case of these countries, I find out that, first of all, these countries are already in financial problems. Most of these financial problems are created either by a combination of civil wars, wars, pandemics, natural disasters, which require those countries to borrow a lot of money, not from China, but from others who would offer money for a high interest rate, because they are in a desperate situation. Then, of course, when the time comes to pay back, they are in a new crisis. So they have to borrow new money to pay the old debt. That's what the debt trap is actually happening.

China proposed the BRI that also loaned money. But in my study, I say we have to look at the quality of the loans. Where do those countries use the money? Chinese loans go to building infrastructure, mostly, and now, industries and agriculture. It increases the productivity of that society. It stimulates economic growth. And that way they will generate more money. And that way they can pay back the loan to China.

The Chinese loans are also very long term. Chinese loans to railways and other projects are like 15/20 years long for the payback. So the countries have to pay a little every year, not everything at once like the Western loans. That means that by the time they have to pay the whole debt, these projects would have created many times more wealth in that country than what they will pay back to China.

So in that way, there's a quality difference between Chinese loans and other loans. And so this is what in every country I studied. I studied Sri Lanka, Pakistan, Zambia, Kenya, and Montenegro, which is in Europe.

I also found out that these countries are very dependent, like Sri Lanka and Montenegro, they are dependent on tourism. That's the main source of income. In 2019, Sri Lanka was hit by terrorist attacks, suicide attacks on Easter Sunday, one in a church and one in a hotel. So tourism dipped. So they lost a lot of income. By the time they recovered in 2020, we had the COVID pandemic. And then the tourism completely collapsed in Sri Lanka and in Montenegro.

Montenegro had borrowed money to build a highway. Chinese company built a highway, like $900 million. So when the time Montenegro economy collapsed completely, and by the time they had to pay back a small, the first small batch over 20 years to China, they couldn't even pay $30 million. And they told the Chinese side, "look, we don't have money to pay." China said, "no problem, you can pay next year."

But in that time, everybody was writing about Montenegro that they have to pay $1 billion back to China this year. It's not true. They have to pay only $30 million and China said, "we forgive you this year, you can pay next year."

All these stories are created to give an image of China and the Belt and Road as something bad and dangerous. And this has become my specialty to show it's not true. So this was a political campaign that has nothing to do with economics or financial studies.

Diplomacy Talk: The BRI is starting its second decade. Can you outline the key changes you've observed in how countries are collaborating under this framework compared with its early years?

Hussein Askary: There was a big emphasis at the beginning on building the infrastructure, which is transport, connectivity, power, electricity generation, water management systems, but also training the labor force.

But now China is at the next stage in the development of the BRI, focusing on industrialization, because many of those countries have resources. Now they have a labor force. But they don't have the technology.

For example, in Egypt, in Ethiopia, in Uganda, many countries, we have industrial parks built by China, deploying Chinese technology and machinery. But the labor and the raw materials are from that country. So it's like both sides meeting in the middle.

Because you need to get some production going on, so these nations can generate income. And China is willing to share technology. Other countries were not willing to share technology. This is the difference between the Chinese initiative and other initiatives. China is giving very good, advanced technologies for producing not only textiles, but even mobile phones, cars in Africa.

So those nations can stand on their feet and start producing the goods they need. China's philosophy is to prosper your neighbor. When you say "to get rich, you first build a road." I added to it, "to stay rich, make your neighbor rich." So this is philosophy of win-win. Actually, it works in reality, because you have to have wealthy customers; making your customers poor is not a good policy. So China is making its customers, through technology, machinery, have a better economic situation. So there is a more equitable trade and cooperation. This is the new stage in the BRI.

Diplomacy Talk: You bring a dual perspective on Middle Eastern affairs, having both an Iraqi and Swedish background. How do you view the current developments in the region? What kind of role can China play in helping solve the conflicts in Middle East?

Hussein Askary: The Palestinian people should have their state. This is also China's position. The majority of the world's nations said it's time to have a Palestinian state.

But after that, you have to have a program of economic development. So people can see that peace pays back. Because what they care about is the living conditions for their children and the future of their children. And if they are not secure about that, and that's why we had this extremism continued in the 1990s and 2000s. So extremist groups were gaining ground because they could get financing from outside to pay people who are angry at the system, who say "we have peace, but I have no food to eat. My children don't have a school. So what kind of peace is that?"

So that's where things have to emerge. We have to have a ceasefire, a Palestinian state, but also economic development. I think the BRI is a fantastic model to get these things in place. We have lots of resources in the region. The region has a fantastic geographical location. We have also enormous financial wealth. The Arab countries export oil. They have $4 trillion in foreign currency reserves. These currency reserves are not really used for economic development. They are invested in Western banks, financial firms, and Western industries.

So if we get these $4 trillion to be part of the financial assets for building the BRI, this will be revolutionary. And these nations realize that they cannot rely on exporting oil forever. They have to have industries. They have to have agriculture, diversify their income, because oil price goes up and down. And if it goes down, you are in trouble. And this happened four times, three times in 10 years. So these countries suffer from dependence on oil.

Now China also has support from the Global South. The majority of the world nations actually support the Palestinian state. But what China should promote even more is that the future of this region depends on economic cooperation and economic development.

So if you put that on the table, at the same time, as you talk about political solutions, it will open people's minds to a positive view of a solution. If you only say "let's stop the war," but you haven't solved the core causes, the original causes of the problem, then you don't solve anything. So I think the Chinese position is correct. There should be a Palestinian state. There should be implementation of the United Nations resolutions in 1967. There should be economic development.

Diplomacy Talk: What challenges do you think the BRI will face in the coming years?

Hussein Askary: The most important challenge is geopolitics, because there are other forces who don't want the BRI to succeed. They are pressuring countries.

Today, in the conference, we had somebody who said clearly that why Brazil did not sign the memorandum for the BRI is because they were threatened directly, publicly by the United States not to do it.

This is a very big issue. I know this from Iraq. The Iraqi government is under enormous pressure not to work with China. Although China is the largest trade partner of Iraq, the largest oil importer from Iraq, but we are not allowed to build major infrastructure in Iraq with China based on the Belt and Road.

So it's this geopolitical pressure, which is the main problem. Other problems include the financial problems of nations that they are unable to get the financial resources for building infrastructure.

So these are very big challenges for the BRI but the worst one is the lack of understanding and cooperation from the EU and the United States.

Diplomacy Talk: What kind of a leader do you think our President Xi Jinping is?

Hussein Askary: What President Xi Jinping worries about is if he's doing something good for the Chinese people or not. Our idea of politicians is that they can say a lot of things to make people vote for them, but then they don't have to implement what they are saying.

So I tell people to understand where China is going, you have to understand the mind of President Xi Jinping and the leadership generally. After understanding his economic thinking and the shift from high-quantity economic activity to high-quality economic development and all these things, I read what he calls "Achilles' heel," the weak point in China. Already, he said in 2014 that it's innovation, and that this is dangerous for China. So the man is visionary, and he understands economics work.

Then by time, I realized that his speeches are very poetic. And he is very philosophical. He thinks about these things he's saying, but also about the future of China.

He's more of a thinker than a politician. He's what we call a statesman. The difference between politician and statesman is very huge. A statesman doesn't care about popularity. He's trying to do what is right, what is good.

So that you have convinced me that Chinese people are in good hands with President Xi Jinping. And he loves the Chinese people. He loves China. And I can see it from his actions.

Diplomacy Talk: Previously, you described Western and Middle Eastern societies as two quite different worlds. Why did you say so? And how would you characterize Chinese society in comparison?

Hussein Askary: The issue is that whatever our differences are, we have to stick to certain common grounds and our respect for other humans, their life, their religion, their culture, and so on and so forth. So it should be seen more of an advantage rather than disadvantage that we have diversity.

It's like in China, you have 56 different ethnic groups in China. This is a source of wealth. It's not a source of problem, and because each group contributes something from inside to the rest. And that makes the society more colorful.

Maybe we in the Arab world have certain traditions and the family tradition and respect for the elderly and ancestors and so on. We have these in common. There are many features that are quite similar between Chinese and Arab or Muslim culture. We also have differences, but I think our differences will reinforce each other, complement each other rather than be problematic.

I traveled a lot around China last year and also this year in many parts of China—the South, the North, the East, and Xinjiang. I saw this wonderful diversity is like, as you say, a garden with a thousand flowers. That's what makes a garden, not one type of flowers. And I think this is very, very beautiful to think about.

Presenter: Gao Anming

General supervisor: Wang Xiaohui

Producer: Li Xiaohua

Production supervisor: Zhang Liying

Editors: Zhang Ruomeng, Zhang Heling, Jiao Yuan, Lyu Yiyi, Xia Fangting

Produced by chinadiplomacy.org.cn