Silk Road wide enough for China-US cooperation

This is the fourth year the United States and China have partnered to train early-career Kabul diplomats, who visit the two countries in order to develop their diplomatic, communications and management skills.

The joint program is a good example for the China-US cooperation in the third-party region, said Chinese Ambassador to US Cui Tiankai.

China-US cooperation on this new front needs a real project, said Yang, the researcher, adding that the "Belt and Road" initiatives could be a meeting place where China and the United States learn to get along with each other on an equal footing and in mutually beneficial way, the core element of the new type of major-country relations.

"Holding fast to the principle of equality and working together for the sustainable development of the region are the key to success," Yang said.

CHALLENGES AHEAD

Possible China-US cooperation on the Silk Road is also expected to meet with challenges besides the die-hard Cold War mentality and the difference of Chinese and US ideologies, experts said.

Several countries along the route, including Pakistan and Afghanistan, are still plagued by conflicts, separatist movements and political instability.

These factors would pose threats to personnel safety, infrastructure construction as well as future investment.

China and the United States should enhance cooperation not only in the field of economy, but also in restoring and maintaining peace and stability in the region, Yang said.

Moreover, their cooperation along the Silk Road will also face challenges from financial sectors. For one thing, it is well-known that infrastructure projects, an important part in both China's and US Silk Road initiatives, need supports from a stable international financial system.

For another, fundamentally speaking, trade cooperation along Silk Road can not do well without good financial services.

The international monetary and financial systems are currently in a phase of adjustment and are crammed with a great deal of uncertainties and instabilities. So to speak, the cooperation between China's Silk Road Economic Belt and US New Silk Road Initiative is troubled with an unstable global financial system.

China and the United States, the world's two largest economies and the world's largest developing and developed countries respectively, should step up cooperation and reach understanding in the area of finance to facilitate cooperative projects along the Silk Road, said Yang.

Despite those challenges, experts said, the Silk Road is wide and long enough for China and the United States to carry out their plans and cooperate.