China's Road to the Middle East

Posted: August 7th, 2016

By Sean Miner

Sean Miner, China program manager and research associate, has been with the Peterson Institute since June 2013. He works under Senior Fellow and Director Emeritus C. Fred Bergsten and Reginald Jones Senior Fellow Gary Clyde Hufbauer on international trade issues between the United States and China. He obtained his MBA from George Washington University where he focused on international business and finance and has a bachelor's degree in government from the University of Texas. He is coauthor of Bridging the Pacific: Toward Free Trade and Investment between China and the United States (2014).

Chinese President Xi Jinping’s proposed “Silk Road” initiative – also called “One Belt, One Road” (OBOR) – has promised to resurrect the ancient Eurasian trading route by investing in connectivity and infrastructure projects on a massive scale across Asia, Europe, and the Middle East. Offering some $1 trillion in total investment, the project has the ability to transform global trade. Sean Miner, China Program Manager at the Peterson Institute for International Economics, sat down with the Cipher Brief to talk about how the OBOR will affect the countries of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) – Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates (UAE), Qatar, Kuwait, Oman, and Bahrain – and the Middle East at large.

The Cipher Brief: How do the New Silk Road Initiatives – the One Belt, One Road initiative specifically – pertain to the Middle East and the countries of the GCC?

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