Dancing with the Dragon
October 28, 2014
Who would have thought? Afghanistan is a rich a country. In the land of medieval-style images depicting turbants, burkas, mud houses and mules in narrow trails, there are also large quantities of raw materials, worth an estimated one trillion euros.
In the north of the country, on the border with Turkmenistan, there are natural gas reserves; in the northeast, right next to China, rare earth metals, an important commodity used in the production of tablets and smartphones, are found; and in central Afghanistan there is a large deposit of copper, the biggest in the region and perhaps even in the world.
It is clear that the war-torn country is unable to exploit the natural resources alone, since it lacks the infrastructure, mining equipment as well as skilled workers and engineers to this end. If Afghanistan was a normal country, investors would be queuing up and outbidding each other with development projects just to be involved in the exploitation of the mineral deposits.
But after a ten-year conflict with the Taliban, the West is slowly withdrawing and making its way back home. Last weekend, the British withdrew the last of their troops. Civilian aid workers will probably follow suit in a not so distant future – at the latest, in a couple of years. Bid farewell to education and economic development.
Against this backdrop, it makes sense that newly-elected President Ashraf Ghani changes direction and that his first state visit overseas is not to Washington but to Beijing. In China, Ghani won't be begging for development aid or military support; instead he has something to offer to the Chinese, a feeling of importance that probably appeals to the wounded Afghan spirit. And Beijing can add a new area of influence to their expanding economic empire.
It's not as if the West hadn't tried to court economic cooperation with Afghanistan. But US and European companies balked at the idea, claiming there was too much risk involved. Who would want to get involved with corrupt authorities or even the Taliban, given the possibility of being cheated or losing all the investments to the conflict? And wouldn't the companies be committing commercial suicide if they didn't enforce minimum standards regarding work safety and salaries?
It is no secret that Chinese entrepreneurs have little or no qualms with these issues, not even when some of their own citizens are affected. There have been various cases of Chinese construction workers who have been killed in the midst of the Afghan conflict. But Chinese companies seem undeterred by this.
However, Kabul should be wary of pure self-interest when conducting business with China. Beijing has already promised a lot - for instance, a railway connection to the copper deposits in Logar Province. The whole of Afghanistan would profit from this railway line, the first in Afghan history, but it remains to be seen whether it will be completed.
When in doubt, Beijing will always put its economic interests first – and if necessary it will cooperate with the Taliban. The losers are therefore clear: the ones with hardships, but also the partly democratic regime in Kabul and the Western community. Even if only a fraction of the profits of the trillion-euro sale of raw materials ends up in the pocktes of the jihadists, they will probably be richer than the "Islamic State" in Syria and Iraq.