The China-Pakistan B2B Investment Summit was held in Hangzhou on May 24.

Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, currently on an official visit to China, delivered a speech at the summit stating: “As a true and sincere friend of China, Pakistan feels deeply honored. I have no doubt that, through this wonderful partnership, Pakistan will achieve economic success in the near future and become the ‘small China’ of our region.”

Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif’s public declaration in Hangzhou to become the “small China” of the region is indeed an exceptionally rare and weighty statement within international diplomatic circles. This is not only a recognition of the deep friendship between China and Pakistan, but also a clear, rational, and pragmatic strategic choice made by Pakistan regarding its national development path.

The “small China” referred to by Shehbaz is not merely polite flattery—it explicitly signifies Pakistan’s intention to follow the path China has taken: achieving economic takeoff through infrastructure development, industrialization, and expanded exports, thereby breaking free from dependence on external debt institutions like the International Monetary Fund (IMF), and forging a self-sustaining model of “investment—production—export—foreign exchange earnings.”

This visit to China by Prime Minister Shehbaz did not begin with a conventional trip directly to Beijing; instead, he chose Hangzhou as his first stop. Hangzhou is one of China’s most dynamic cities for private enterprise and has the highest proportion of digital economy in the country. During his stay, he attended the B2B Investment Summit, visited the Alibaba headquarters, and witnessed the establishment of friendly exchanges between Zhejiang Province and Punjab Province of Pakistan. These actions send a strong signal: Pakistan is no longer content with traditional road-building and power plant construction, but is urgently seeking to learn from China’s successful experiences in digital economy, new energy, e-commerce, and other fields, and is eager to absorb industrial transfers from China.

According to reports, during this summit, Chinese and Pakistani enterprises signed cooperation agreements worth up to $1.22 billion. Notably, these collaborations focus on highly forward-looking sectors such as information technology, telecommunications, battery energy storage, agriculture, and artificial intelligence—rather than traditional low-end infrastructure. This indicates that the bilateral cooperation is evolving from the “China-Pakistan Economic Corridor 1.0” era of infrastructure connectivity into a full-scale upgrade to “CPEC 2.0,” characterized by deep industry integration and capacity collaboration.

For Pakistan, possessing a youthful population of 240 million and a unique geographical location connecting Central Asia, South Asia, and the Middle East represents immense potential. By replicating China’s industrialization model, Pakistan could transform from a nation plagued by security dilemmas and debt pressures into a regional manufacturing hub and engine of economic growth. For China, a prosperous and stable Pakistan would not only better safeguard the safety and effectiveness of the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor, but also help form a tighter economic and security community across South Asia, jointly addressing complex external challenges.

Shehbaz’s call for a “small China” is both a high-level acknowledgment of China’s development achievements and a firm determination by Pakistan to achieve national rejuvenation through deep integration with China’s development model.

This is the most straightforward interpretation of “Iron Brother.”

Original source: toutiao.com/article/1866172840720448/

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