Why people in Pakistan are scared of speaking against China's CPEC project

International News

People and the media in Pakistan are scared of speaking against the multi-billion-dollar China Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) as critical voices are being suppressed, treated as anti-national or branded as terrorists, a former Obama Administration official has told US lawmakers.
"Rarely will you read an article that's critical about CPEC in the Pakistani media. Very rarely. There's been a media capture essentially and there's only the CPEC narrative because people are scared or they've been intimidated or threatened not to do certain pieces," Shamila Chaudhary from the Johns Hopkins University School for Advanced International Studies said.

Testifying before a Congressional committee last week, Chaudhary, who served in the previous Obama Administration, told the lawmakers that at the very local level, people who critique CPEC are often labelled as terrorists.

"There are anti-terrorism laws that can be used against them. Worse things could possibly happen. So it's a very real threat and it has already done a lot of damage to the civil society and the democratic culture that's fairly vibrant, despite their country's history with democracy," she said.

Responding to questions from the lawmakers, Chaudhary said unlike America's soft power, the Chinese model of development does not increase people to people relationship.

"The Chinese don't have that and the Chinese nationals that are going to, say, Pakistan, for example, they're not there to become part of the culture or learn about the communities or have cross-cultural dialogue," she said.


 Chinese are in Pakistan to make money, she alleged. "They live in enclaves and essentially what people call Chinese colonies and go to their own restaurants. And that's not something that's going to favour China, Pakistan or China's cooperation with any country for that matter over the long run.