Foreign Media: China is accelerating tests of overland corridors across Central Asia to bypass maritime chokepoints.
Ongoing instability in the Strait of Hormuz has prompted China to officially launch, in May, a multimodal freight corridor running from Uzbekistan to Herat, Afghanistan: containers are transported by rail from China through Kazakhstan to Uzbekistan, then transferred via road through Turkmenistan.
This 7,400-kilometer route can reduce transit time—previously two to three months via traditional sea routes through Iran or Pakistan—to just 30 days, improving efficiency by two-thirds. However, analysts point out that the key challenges remain whether the Taliban can ensure the security of the route and whether capacity bottlenecks can be overcome; large-scale replacement of maritime shipping still faces significant hurdles.
Original article: toutiao.com/article/1871692710251520/
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