Dear Sir
I do know that some of the Russian states bordering China can benefit from CPEC but its impact will be limited and economically may or not be viable depending on the nature of product. What I see is, CPEC ends near Kashgiar, China will take it further to Urumqi, if some Russian companies find it cost effective to use CPEC route via Kashgiar, its fine but it got little to do with Pakistan unless Pakistan takes Russian contracts and delivers goods to Russia by paying transit fee to China
The point i was making is, Moscow is near Europe. Most of Russia already has abundance of natural resources so their bilateral trade with this region is limited that they can use to gain benefit from CPEC
I agree totally. What are they going to do? Export Russian Vodka to Saudia Arabia?
Most people here seem to be blissfully unaware what Gwadar is about. The anwser lies within not without.
*Or are Russian Oligarchs going to live in Gwadar soak the sunshine with their Yachts, racy women, bars and gambling?
That still is a longgggg distance. Unless Russians are looking to increase trade with Africa it might not be of big advantage to them. The have plenty of oil so that middle east connectivity wont be as charming for them either.
Anyway, a welcoming news as we get isolated further!!
Russians Might not get a lot of benefit from Gawadar. The main purpose of Gawadar was an ease of access to middle east. Russians already have Oil & gas dumps, why would they need it.
Yes few of it's states which are near to Pak may get some benefits from it.
whats the deal with the focking warm waters anyways? been hearing about 'em since the '80s
Not entirely true. Most of what is Russia is on its western end, in the European theatre. Central to Eastern Russia is Siberia which is a little more than tundra.
It is a mindbogglingly huge, desolate, empty stretch of land where, due to its treacherous climate and terrain, there is virtually nothing; no notable population, no notable industry, just pristine wilderness. These Population Density and Machine Building Industry maps give you a very good idea of what we are talking about,
While looking at just the map one intuitively thinks that Russia has easy access to the big East Asian, South East Asian and Oceanic Markets from its eastern coast but due to the Siberian stretch, as explained above, it is easier said than done. Russia did build the Trans-Siberian Railway (Longest railway route in the world. Shown on the map below) to transport goods across the length of the country to its port-city of Vladivostok on its eastern coast but given the nature of the weather and terrain, along with the extreme distance, this route remains and will remain extremely limited. Transporting large amounts of Russian imports and exports across Siberia is nearly impossible.
The next obvious route for Russia would be the Northern Sea Route through the arctic waters, as shown in the map above. However, the Arctic sea ice, in the winters, expands all the way from the Arctic Ice Sheet to the Russian coast closing this route for most of the year (also shown in the map above). Even during the warmer seasons this shipping route is extremely treacherous.
Hence, Russia is left with just the Southern Sea Route for its trade with all the South Asian, South East Asian, East Asian and Oceanic economies. This route is even longer than the route China faces for its trade with the European Markets.
All of the above is the reason behind the Russian obsession with the 'warm waters' of the Arabian Sea since forever. This is where and why CPEC offers Russia tremendous benefit; a much shorter, much safer and a lot cheaper route to all the markets mentioned above. CPEC is to Russia with regards to the East Asian, South East Asian and Oceanic markets as it is to China with regards to the European and Middle Eastern markets. Even East Africa would be easier to access for Russia.
