A road is not a corridor |
THE inauguration of a road through the Wakhan Corridor on October 4 has drawn more commentary than its size warrants. The 121km unpaved track runs through Badakhshan to the edge of the Chinese frontier and the Taliban Administration built it with its own money and engineers. It completes a project first begun in 2019 under the previous, US-backed government in Kabul. The Taliban have hailed it as a historic link to the world’s second-largest economy. A recent Asia Times analysis went further and presented the road as a test of Pakistan’s hold over Kabul. Read that way, it becomes an early threat to the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor.
Both readings mistake a road for a corridor. A trade corridor needs infrastructure, a commercial reason to use it, a sponsor willing to pay for it and a security environment that traders and insurers can price. Wakhan falls short on each count and on current evidence it will not rival CPEC. It does carry a political message, however, and Islamabad should heed it.
Consider first the physical and institutional realities. The road, which reportedly cost around $5.5 million, climbs towards the Wakhjir Pass at nearly 4,900 metres, in terrain that is snowbound for much of the year and almost........