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A blank spot on the New Silk Road TEXT
Edda Schlager
Kazakhstan: The transcontinental country is not only the world’s largest land-locked nation; it also lies equidistant from all its oceans, i.e. smack-dab in the middle. This geography is making it an increasingly important hub for international trade within the initiative “Belt and Road.” Sometimes the trains from China run late. Then the workers at Khorgas Gateway Dry Port on the Kazakh-Chinese border wait impatiently until a distant signal sounds and a train announces its arrival with loud blasts of its horn. On the final stretch, the wagons with their dozens of containers slowly roll over the rails until they come to a stop at one of the buffers bearing a Chinese flag. Three huge gantry cranes straddle the parallel sets of tracks in the Dry Port. Painted a striking yellow that glows against the blue sky here in the far eastern corner of Kazakhstan, they have evolved into an easily recognizable hallmark for Khorgas, one of the key transhipment hubs between east and west. Some of the tracks are 1,435 millimeters wide – for the trains hailing from China; the others, whose buffers wear the Kazakh flag, measure 1,524 millimeters and head from here westwards, deeper into the country. Due to the divergent track widths, the containers are transferred from the Chinese to the Kazakh trains in Khorgas to continue their journey towards Europe. A part of the Soviet Union until 1991, Kazakhstan has the same track width as Russia and most of the other former Soviet Republics; China’s tracks have the same measurements as Europe’s. Khorgas is one of two border posts between Kazakhstan and China. Goods are transhipped here that originate in Lianyungang or Chengdu; they are headed for the Caspian Sea and ultimately the German port of Hamburg. Some 200 kilometers to the northeast, at the Dostyk/ Alashankou border crossing, goods stemming from Zhengzou, Shenzhen and Chengdu are processed which will then be transported through Kazakhstan, Russia and Poland on the northern route to Germany and Europe.
In recent years, Kazakhstan has become a main transit country on the New Silk Road – that tremendous infrastructure project launched in 2013 by China. Inspired by the historic medieval Silk Road, the corridor crossing the Eurasian continent has considerably reduced the time needed to transport goods from China to Europe: from 45 days on the sea route around India to a mere 16 days overland. This sparked major expansions in the highway and rail networks in Kazakhstan. Yet no matter which means of transport is deployed, journeys here are normally protracted. Kazakhstan is the ninth largest country in the world. It extends from the Chinese border more than 3,000 kilometers to the Caspian Sea. A trip from Khorgas to Aktau, the country’s most important port on its western coast, takes two and a half days if the connections are good and traverses several time zones. On the way lies a fascinating panoramic country bridging the orient and occident – and one that is often perceived by Europeans as a blank spot on the map. Trains coming from Khorgas travel the Turkestan-Siberia Railway, called Turksib. Since its completion in 1931, it has connected Russia to the Central Asian republics. Stretching some 2,350 kilometers, Turksib runs from the Russian Novosibirsk to Arys near Shymkent in southern Kazakhstan. It links the still important mining centers of Semei (formerly Semi palatinsk) and Oskemen (formerly Ust-Kamenogorsk) in the northeastern corner with the rest of Kazakhstan. Not located on the Turksib line, but rather 700 kilometers westward, embedded in endless steppes, lies the country’s capital, Nur-Sultan. The city’s name has often been changed, always for political reasons, to mark a new chapter in Kazakh history. Until 1991 it was called Tselinograd, which then changed to Akmolinsk to mark the country’s independence. And when the city was crowned the new Kazakh capital, it was rechristened Astana. Since 2019, this urban center with over a million inhabitants has gone by the name Nur-Sultan in honor of its longtime president, Nursultan Nasarbajew, who resigned that year.
