How the Belt and Road Initiative Can Help Strengthen the Role of the SCO and Deepen China’s Cooperation with Russia and the Countries of Central Asia

China and Russia issued a joint statement on 8 May 2015 outlining the main approaches to linking the Silk Road Economic Belt (SREB) and the Eurasian Economic Union (EAEU) projects. Both parties believe that to build the ‘Belt and Road’ project, it is necessary to use economic integration laws and actively enhance the role of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SOC) in stimulating regional economic cooperation, promoting construction of the SREB and linkage to and cooperation with the EAEU, creating a Free Trade Area (FTA) in the Asia-Pacific region (APR) and simultaneously begin creating a similar FTA among China, Russia and Central Asia to gradually stimulate interstate trade and promote regional economic development, actively developing—along with an improved model of energy cooperation—infrastructure and related industry and strengthening business contacts and jointly promoting construction of the SREB