Preliminary Results of the Development of the European Direction of China's “Polar Silk Road” Initiative

The article discusses the results achieved by China in promoting the “Polar Silk Road” (PSR) Initiative in the Arctic. The preconditions for the development of the ideological and conceptual basis of the PSR Initiative consisted of the growing alarmism in the late 2000s around the forecasts of climate change and the volume of Arctic resources. Under these conditions, the Western thesis of an Ice-Free Arctic (wubin beiji) was developed in China’s expert community. China’s leadership changes in 2012 and Xi Jinping's promotion of new foreign policy ideas of “Belt and Road” and “community of humanity's destiny” revitalised the expert discourse, reorienting it to form within a new conceptual framework. Under these condition in 2017 the PSR Initiative was launched. As a result of the West's counteraction, and narrowing of China’s investment opportunities, the prospects for expanding the partnership within the framework of the PSR Initiative, which is still not recognized by any Arctic state, including Russia, are decreasing. Thus, Beijing's desire to focus on the implementation of two directions of China's policy in the Arctic is analysed: deepening Russia-China cooperation in the Arctic Zone of the Russian Federation and ensuring participation in dealing with issues related to the central part of the Arctic Ocean.