Good morning. My name is chairmans mark. Im a senior fellow with the Geoeconomics Center of Atlantic Council. I would like to welcome you to our next session where we are going to dig into development and finance, chinas lending, aid, its investments and what is being called the global south. Im going to use the moderators privilege and refer to low income and middle Income Countries. That seems to be a more neutral term than what we were using before. Real quickly, just to introduce the topic. We found a great deal today about a lot of the big picture aspects of chinas interaction with the developing world. And to think what were going to try to do here is sort of dig into the lifeblood of this interaction, which is money. The lending investment and a that china has offered to both low income and middle Income Countries over the past decade amounts to a vast sum, well over a trillion dollars. Based on a data statistics the commitment or even larger than that. Theres a lot of issues that now revolve around the flow of capital out of china to these countries come and many of you are aware that the linda in particular is contributed to a debt problem in many countries now that has to be addressed, and even presentbe a potentially serious risk to chinese lenders at a moment of economic downturn in china. So what will get into this now and what i want to do is really quickly introduce our speakers and then well turn to questions. We have two speakers today who are joining as remotely. First from new delhi is veda vaidyanathan, an associate fellow in Foreign Policy and security at the center for social ander economic progress. Xi is also affiliated with harvard universities asia center, and the institute of chinese studies of new delhi. Joining us from copenhagen is an alonso Council Colleague who is with the global china hub, also a senior fellow and choose direct just finance interest, a Nongovernment Organization focus on issues related to Development Finance. We are having some issues today and so xi will be with us invoice and not by picture. Im sure that will not interfere with our participation in the slightest. Now, sitting here at the table at the center is Samantha Custer who is director of policy analysis at aiddata which is a a research lab at william and mary College Global research institute. Sams team at aiddata examines form policy and Development Issues and is well known, very well known for his work on chinas lending. And last and certainly not least, to my left of the table, is a senior policy fellow at the center for global 2000 w. Gyude moore here in washington, a lecture university of chicagos Harris School for Public Policy and a former senior official in library under president Ellen Johnson sirleaf. Welcome to all of you. Why dont we get right into the question, going to focus in on the debt issue for the moment. I would like to start with veda please. Can you talk to us a bit about chinas approach to Development Aid in lower and middle Income Countries, how it might differ from the practices of traditional western donors, multilateral institutions and what you see are some of the key principles guiding chinas policy . First off, very quickly, its wonderful to be here and thank you so muc for having me. Imacs are going to use the shoulder because its easy to say at this point. Back. I think there are a bunch of factors that chinese lending to the global south especially countries in africa region that a study closely, one of them would be a number and the sheer types of lenders they are. I think would be chinaafrica they came out of the study of years ago that said in early 2000 there were three chinese lenders and nowow that i think 9 or so. So i think the sheer number of other chinese, the kind of lenders, the kind of terms that they lend on, all that is incredibly diverse. Influence te see. For instance, one example is the Technology Demonstration center. The idea of technology not just transfer technology, but skills it is a motive where scientists work very closely where Sciences Scientists from Different Countries are host. One of their countries, the one in zambia, where they were working closely with professors. The construction the money for the construction came from china, some of the labs and some of the equipment were locally sourced. A lot of the Community Farmers came to the center, but the impact of the center itself and what it did is a different story. Similarly, there is capacity building. I think a few members talked about highlevel educational visits, sending fuhrer cats bureaucrats to other parts of the country. To give you another perspective, i was in the province in zombie a zambia and there was a tiny vocational center. A lot of flyers and a lot of conversations about how they could send technicians from these tiny universities to places in china. The idea of really bringing a nuanced perspective to the society of this capacity, but it sets it apart. Chinese lending is not uniforms. I think five or six countries in africa account for five 5 or 6 of lending. These are things that set chinese lending apart. This is one of the reasons why china is seen as an alternative to a lot of the countries in the global south and one of the reasons china has been maybe not winning, its also because of this. Sam, lets turn to you and take a Bigger Picture view of the debt issue. Can you talk about how your understanding of how china manages its lending practices and debt relations with countries and what are some of the implications of chinas debt diplomacy to the recipient countries economic stability and sovereignty . I think i will start by building off of the great answer. When i think about one of the differences and uniqueness of what china offers to the world, i go to my fivepoint cheat sheet. One is the scale of what we are talking about. We are talking about 1. 3 trillion in financing that far outstrips most other donors on the market speed. We are talking about things like bigticket Infrastructure Projects, a typical chinese finance Infrastructure Projects is two and a half times as much as the competitor. Focus, i think it was alluded to, traditionally when you think about the chronic infrastructure deficits that the global south is facing, when you are looking at where to finance that, china used to be one of the only funders in town. Terms are important. China i have a colic that likes to call china a banker and not a benefactor. When you look at how china is doing this, its debt instruments such as loans approaching market rates. Its a little bit different than what we see. Transparency was challenging when it comes to debt conversations, unlike an actor like the u. S. Or the u. K. That i report its terms and its products to the ocd, how is china managing all of this portfolio. Its been interesting to watch. I think china has been strategic and opportunistic but it didnt have a master plan. You think back to 2013, it positioned itself as a go to infrastructure lender and it was critical because it bankrolled Infrastructure Projects at scale. What we see 10 years in is that we are dealing with the unintended repercussions of these choices. We now see that 55 of the loans that china has been providing for the global south are now entering into repayment. By 2030, that will be 75 . The global south has accumulated a large debt burden, 2. 6 billion including principal and interest. Thats a lot of money to repay. And we are seeing growing pains in china is trying to adapt on the fly. You see them start to act and to deal with the fact that they have become not only the largest infrastructure banker but they are the largest debt collector in the world. You are seeing interesting things like the inclusion of collateral. 75 of projects include things like escrow accounts. If you are engaging in risky markets, you need to park money somewhere so you can access this if they are slow to repay. Penalties are sharper if people are late on repayment. You are looking at emergency lender kick in. How do you increase the liquidity struggling to repay . You are seeing professionalization. 39 different actors, we are counting over 700. There is the shift to commercial entities. These are commercial state owned banks in china, but also western commercial banks, like Standard Chartered and they are cofinancing these loans. Different things to navigate these risks. Restructuring is now becoming a part of the debt picture. Do you see chinas efforts to restructure as beginning to damage its relations with recipient countries. Weve heard various reports about debt trap and whether or not thats an accurate description of chinas policy, its part of the narrative. How do you see this playing out . I hate the term i hate the term debt trap diplomacy because i think it has the unfortunate coincidence being wrong. But aside from that i think it assumes countries lack agency. It takes two people to sign up to these agreements. But i think youre right, like there is this challenge, what happens on country starts feeling the burn and having to repay what happens. Similar to what i said before, china is fun middle a banker with this. What you dont see often is outright im writing off these loans, im forgiving them. You see it sporadically. Every once and while they are likely old loans that are basically bad loans, or there with the ones that were early on that were like 0 or very low concession elda. Theres kind of not too mucha burden for china to write off. Thats not whats happening in both cases. Youre seeing a willingness to restructure and deferred, to push out when these loans are due, to restructure the financing terms oflo these thin, thats far more common. But what you see in the demand side in global south countries, theres a variety of reactions. On one hand theres caution. You are seeing an uptick in projects that are being suspended or canceled. There areei about 94 of them now and i think when you look at the details of most of these things its often domestic governance that are starting to pull back. Thats an Early Warning signal of maybe nothing of this is a heyday is not as high as it used to be. I think also use Approval Ratings for china kind of a course measure going down globally because of some other high profile difficulty these countries are having. Heres the challenge, its not all bad news for all of pushback from countries. Countries are still signed agreements. I saw one from sri lanka the other day, country that had a major embarrassing, bessie default. That only because a child the party because of china and is still signed on to new agreements with china. China still the number one preferred infrastructure partner in the global south. We as leaders of 120 countries, 40 said china is our preferred partner. In africa it is even higher. Theres a willingness that you have to be careful wariness but i think china still a nepartner. Lets take this a little further, sort of the perspective of recipient countries at this point. How do they perceive recipient countries, how did they proceed chinas development assistance, Lending Finance . What factors do you think are shaping their the decisioe with china on developments and initiatives . And do they see clear benefits to engaging with china like this . Li again, its a pleasure to be here and thank you. I think kenyas experience over the last seven or ten days is pretty instructive. For the last three years most emerging economies, most of the ones in africa, were effectively shutting out the international markets. They couldnt go to the markets to issue debt. Of which can you actually did over the last say seven to ten days was 10. 5 . So the sovereign had to borrow. Thats how steep it is. There was a study that shows country the issue debt at 10. 5 come for the for the 60 would eventually default on that. Thats how bad it is. From china wasnt concessional. It was close to market weight but it wasnt as if african countries had these options. The number of options werent that much. And what it was about this relationship is a part of what we are seeing is a reflection of african interest and demand. Im just speaking from the african side. In 19752002, it was declining at 8. 9 a year. East asia was almost 30 . This is the complex when the chinese show up, a person projects at a certain margin, 500 million ord more so there s an understanding but what options are there . This is the population growing fast which means since the 1990s, they said 45 economies depend on commodity exports 2 of the revenue. Its an added value for what is exported and it needs africa is spending less and less to pay for its infrastructure and about social services and china is the only one edible enough this risk and this is the part they will deal with. Theres not an absence of understanding the implications, is just a few are going to govern, i have this thing where i say that the closer it is to china but democracy means campaigning we promise we are going tode deliver across the structure so you turn to the one thats most likely to provide infrastructure metaphors for we are seeing 90s funding across the developing world drop sharp because of the problems emerging and the problems the chinese economy is facing. I want to come back in a moment but first ild would like to brig her in to this discussion, i think it is useful to look beyond the economic and plantwide northlands a bit and impact the Chinese Foreign ads on issues related to governance and rule of law and particularly the infrastructure landing. I know you work on this, could you talk about the extent to which chinas finance conditionality on loans, increased amount involvement as a result of all of this financial support, policies of government and how it can affect the recipient governments interacting with their own citizens please. Thank you for having me here. I want to take a moment to offer another view and what we are seeing in recipient countries. The work extensively with citizens and unfortunately have to play the devils advocate here in the notion that Chinese Investments fulfill Development Needs are observation monitoring. What we have seen is the vastness of chinas financing little social economic or environmental conditions attached to it and like lending it leads to changing legislation. Governed human rigs protection in order to facilitate greater capital flows from china. Even as they have faulted demands for greater transparency. The impacts are multifaceted in terms of the scale. I think as it was put, chinas Infrastructure Project has been put to scale. The majority are largescale Infrastructure Projects that ultimately, first and foremost, benefited export demands and needs of Chinese Companies, many of which have been blacklisted by organizations for a variety of reasons. So the question really is, against this backdrop of context , and particularly the risks associated with that type of context, countries have had devastating impacts, their own climate environmental rights. I think listening to todays discussion, there has been a lot of backandforth on countries narratives about Chinese Investments and benefits. But ultimately, i think there are a couple of points where we are already concerned with transparency. I think in previous sessions it eliminated a sense of agency in demand from host countries with Chinese Investments. The question is, have citizens been given access to providing input, and putting forward their own demand. Do citizens really want bridging projects, corridors that actually do not provide any benefits to them. Secondly, we are also witnessing Information Transparency across several countries in southeast asia, in Southeast Europe and central europe, where countries circumvent their only way in preventing citizens and having information that are very important for ensuring those projects. Secondly, where is the public in the discussion . Lets not forget the particular chinese characteristics, which are basically denying the public which is a patient in such discussions. Unfortunately, as a result of that, we are also seeing how receiving countries are increasingly developing and employing a difficult approach in miniaturizing those projects, in order to protect both Chinese Companies and the host most importantly, we talk about citizens. Which are the foundation of every nation. Hopefully still. Very few of their rights are recognized. There is increasing criminalization and clamping down on citizens and civil organizations. But countries where china actually is a leading, or one of the largest fbi actors fdi actors. Those are the reflections i can offer. Can we follow up on the point you made at the end about the impact on the citizenry . What issues and options does that present to Civil Society organizations on the ground in these countries in the face of these issues . That is to you, wawa. This question requires days and months. Unfortunately, over the past decade, since the socalled strategy which transformed into this noncohesive ideation. We have seen increasing strengthening in concrete terms and out of an abundance of caution, i will not name the countries and specific actors and citizens negatively affected by chinese lending investments. The majority experienced increasing reprisals for even seeking the most minimum information relating to the nature of the project, concerning environmental impacts, as well as social impacts ranging from resettlement, involuntary rehousing. Again, we are seeing despite the trillion dollar amount that has been poured into chinas Infrastructure Investment and Development Projects, there is increasing disengagement on the ground. This is a moment for china to, against the backdrop of what the other speakers have eliminated, illuminated, thinking of pausing Chinese Investment inflow into their countries. This is a moment for china to reconsider whether Development Projects solely by china help the people. We need to have more honest conversation about that in addition to the socalled economics and indebtedness. Ultimately, the citizens bore th e debt. Although there is lack of agency if we look at many countries and regions i mentioned about. Back to you. Judy, would you like to develop . This is an important point. Someone with my background, i was the minister of works building infrastructure, and before that, i ran the president s delivery unit which was largely about infrastructure. Sometimes there is a plan for the negative externalities of investments we do. This is an important point for us to discuss. Part of it is, at least in that part of the world, the attractiveness of china as a partner. When the chinese first came to africa in the early 2000s for the first policy, they were regime agnostic. It can be democratically elected or run by a military junta. The chinese are willing to do business. Secondly, there was no strings attached. It didnt mean it didnt have an interest, it just meant they didnt demand policy reform in exchange for their engagement. On a continent where there werent that many democratic countries, and a lot of strong men, it was an excellent partner. But i remember being here as a graduate student in the early 2000s and going to an event at the cato institute. And the president of senegal was talking about how, as an african president , if you wanted to do anything, for decades, the only options you had were brussels and washington. Because brussels and washington always colluded, whatever brussels told you was echoed in washington. The rise of beijing is a third note of International Power increased the leverage of countries in his position looking to do something different. So, regardless of what it is, any new thing bestows advantages, but also comes with greater disadvantages. Wawas point about the impact on institutions is worth taking into account. But someone in my position, that may be a blind spot. Would you like to comment with any perspectives . I just want to build on what both samantha and guyde mentioned. The idea about the availability when it comes to china being the only option. I hope we talk about this more on the panel. I think other countries like india even the u. S. Need to reimagine how we can provide alternatives. We cannot compete with the factors samantha mentioned. The speed, the scale, the instruments china has at its disposal. We have to reimagine how we can pool resources and find out turn it investments to engage the goebel south. Alternate investments to engage the global south. I would like to return to the question about the sharp drop in the volume of chinese lending were witnessing. This has been going on for five years. Please correct me if im wrong in that. China is experiencing sharp economic slowdown, which has contributed, along with the debt problems that emerged at the time of the covid pandemic to its pulling back to a much higher level of have been see higher level of hesitancy about blanket lending across the developing world. Im curious, sam, how you and your colleagues are analyzing it. And do you see that this in essence opens doors for other alternatives for lending from other lenders . I will come back to you in a minute. We might bring india into this most directly. It is the right question. Let me provide some state of play and break that down. First, people often ask me, is china getting out of the infrastructure game . I say it, i dont think that is the case, but it is changing. I like to say china is pivoting from bankrolling new Infrastructure Projects to bailing out the old infrastructure. It wants to make sure these things dont fail before it starts bankrolling new initiatives. You are seeing still a formidable amount of lending that is actually more than what you see from the u. S. But it is more in the form of this emergency lending and trying to boost liquidity. So, it is shifting. In terms of the broader challenges you outlined for china, it is true, you see declining industrial productivity. You see in patients at home. China has grappled with this for a long time. Citizens asking pointed questions, which is interesting, given the low levels of freedom of expression. Why are we bankrolling development in other countries where we have when we have substantial inequalities at home . I wont say the idea that china is bankrupt is probably not helpful. Look at an indicator light foreign currency reserves. China has over 3 trillion in foreign currency reserves. That far outstrips any country, including the u. S. This is what is the fuel to continue to finance things like xis Signature Development initiative. Financially, they have a formidable warchest. Because it is so highly tied to xi, it is almost too big to fail. They can totally throw this in the rubbish bin. But the Risk Appetite is indeed changing because china has gotten burned way too many times. The question of where we go from here is one of supply and demand. The supply question is, will china continue to be willing to supply . I think it will continue to supply that may be at lower levels. It will be less willing to invest in the riskiest countries. It will be less willing to take on the riskiest project. You see them trying to diversify the type of projects they are investing in. This raises a one very of quandary of how does this align to what partners expect from china . It goes back to what i said earlier. As late as 2023 last year, people viewed china as the infrastructure banker. If china is not willing to be the infrastructure banker, it puts it at odds with what these countries want. That does create an opportunity for some other players we talked about. There is also questions about whether these players will show up in a meaningful way. Historically, the g7 including the u. S. Has been long on rhetoric and light on actual financing of these infrastructure initiatives. There is a question whether that will change. Two different ways alternative players be it india or others in the region and the u. S. Can thing about this. One is in direct competition. Meaning, how do you reduce the likelihood that lending can create negative externalities in countries . That is investing and doubling down in the types of things like building a strong Civil Society, investigative journalism, watchdog capacity. It is a building the capacity of people in eight management units to effectively assess what is whether it is worth taking on Debt Financing and can we pay . On the debt side, it india or the u. S. Or whomever wants to go head to head on delivering infrastructure, we have to majorly increase the amount of money were willing to put on the table. The u. S. With the Development Finance corporation is an interesting thing. You are seeing increase in our own Debt Financing overseas. If that continues in scale not only to europe and other countries may be we will have something to offer to compete. There has been a lot of rhetoric out of the g7 about going in this direction, but fundamentally, not a lot of money. Veda, coming back to alternative sources, do you think the pulling back by china that were witnessing, or the slowing down of lending, presents opportunities for other countries . Other lenders . I know india is active in many parts of the developing world in this, but not on the scale of china obviously. Im curious what perspective you might offer. That has been very interesting. In my conversations, take the info structure sector, my conversations with managers, several indian infrastructure companies, everyone brought up china before i brought up china. Which is to say, it has completely changed the way business is usually done. At the same time, the feedback i kept getting was lets not get stuck on the competition china brings to the table because the market is so huge. The african infrastructure gap, everyone knows it is huge. There is a lot of opportunity for players to step up. There was never a problem of them losing business because of chinese capitation. Indian access onto the landscape has been active in africa for many years. Especially the private sector. When we start to imagine renewed indian interest in africa, the private sector traditionally has taken the lead. I foresee they will continue to take the lead. What could happen possibly as the government of India Working in some form or fashion closely with the private sector may be trying to identify projects, to align their activities. But again, its obviously not at the scale china is offering. I dont think china withdrawing necessarily is the only factor at play here. I also want to mention a lot of indian tech companies, and Indian Telecom companies, our social enterprises in india that have been successful in finding lowcost, Scalable Solutions for big problems in india. Our now sharing their knowledge and models with governments and provinces in several african countries. You see beyond the state and private sector, you see models of cooperation emerge from india. Which has a lot of hope. What is encouraging is a lot of these models, some are financed from the u. S. And europe so there is potential for triangular cooperation at a moment like this. I was shifted direction before we go to the audience questions. Were talking debt. Normally, when you talk about International Sovereign debt, you end up talking about the Bretton Woods institutions, the restructuring of loans under their guidance. I will stay out of this one even though i spent more than 20 years at the imf. And let other people offer probably fresh perspectives. What im interested in, is what you all think about the role of international organizations, multilateral institutions, in monitoring and addressing the impact of chinas debt diplomacy on recipient countries who are now turning to the and others for support. Gyude, would you like to lead off . Big countries, china and the United States, some of the europeans attempt to continue to drive Foreign Policy through the way their executive director is vote whether it is the imf or the world bank. The issue of shares reallocation to reflect the expanding growth in india and chinas economies creates problems with these institutions. For the imf and the world bank, they have to be careful, so they dont step on the toes of the very big actors, including china. In the case of the zambian debt, even though the chinese eventually walked this back. But initially, china insisted the multilaterals also take a haircut. China commercial bank. But one of their policy banks be treated basically not as a stateowned enterprise. And basically what it meant was there is no law that says multilateral institutions are preferred creditors. If china has continued to argue that, where multilateral creditors were treated like any commercial bank, it will impair the Current Development model. Model development banks, they have the aaa ratings because we know, no one will default on debt with Multilateral Development banks. Without that risk, they can have the aaa model. The argument china was making would have collapsed that model. It was great, but china walked that back. There are challenges to monitoring because we need a disinterested to some extent thirdparty who can be an arbiter to say who has a fair outlook on what is happening in a countrys finances. Chinas argument that it is not attempting to change the international system. That china is a and tripping member of the international system, that argument would have suffered if china had continued that. That remains a challenge. If i spend a semester in china and about four months ago, the Foreign Ministry gave this speech locally in which he said if the west by west, he meant the United States wanted to compete, he said we should see who can build the most roads in developing countries. People went crazy on weibo, like, who is supposed to pay for this . Because the economy in china is not going is great. When you travel the country you see a lot of, im not talking abandoned cities without people, i mean stalled projects. You go to shopping malls, you can see visible evidence. So, that changed itself. The way china behaves globally is also going to change. It might provide an opportunity for the global gateway, which is the european thing, or pgii, the g7 one led by the United States. My colleagues at the center for global develop it, their conclusion is that global gateway was a repackaging of old commitments. Even though there is an opportunity for a new actor to emerge, there doesnt seem to be a new actor. Wawa, staying with the international organizations, when he touched on this, the Bretton Woods institutions, often their conditionality relates to governance, transparency and related issues. Do you think that given the nature of the debt crisis right now, that there is a need for them to reengage, or engage with a higher profile in addressing these issues . Many of which you suggest have worsened under the chinese. Thats an excellent question. I dont know that i can answer in entirety, but i will give it a try. First, i would like to take a step back and refocus on governance, and how china has reshaped that. The world bank, which is a u. S. Founded bank, was attempting to integrate human rights, Due Diligence and a number of other important governance aspects into safeguards. China knows this will interfere with internal affairs. In the end, china won. According to my research from a scientist who has studied the Bretton Woods institutions, china establishing its own competitor to the Bretton Woods institutions, the beijingled Asian Infrastructure bank in 2015. What ensued was very little support from countries like the United States and japan. China won a major diplomatic victory where the g7 split aip membership through the western governors. It was able to gain a major Credit Rating of aaa. China, india and russia the largest shareholders do not have such a rating. Nor does the development bank. In 2018, it issued a response to Capital Markets to increase to a hundred billion dollars. Back to your question. It seems china is clearly testing out an alternative order what we have been discussing. This does impact the government aspect. It is the only way to hold any institution accountable. For it to allow citizen participation. Unfortunately, with aib, we are seeing a weakening of standards across the board. [indiscernible] where it concerns transparency, accountability, human rights. To the extent that the Bretton Woods institution are now separating human rights from development. I am probably deviating from your question. This is what i can offer. Thank you, that is very helpful. We have time for a couple of audience questions. We have a little over five minutes left. Lets stay with transparency but from a different point of view. The question is do we see a difference in terms of transparency, or lending between countries with stronger Democratic Institutions and Civil Society versus ones where those institutions are weaker . Even if there was little choice in borrowing, how much agency do local governments have to set more accountable terms. Sam, is this something you and your team has taken a look at. We could speak to that anecdotally, country by country. China is still highly restrictive in what it publicizes on the supplier side. What can change depending on the level of democracy and openness at the country level, is what recipient partners to china are willing to publish. For every deal on the china side, there is one on the recipient countrys side. Depending on the legal environment, there is a higher burden of disclosure in some democracies. How much agency do people have . I think it still comes down to the degree and supply. How many options to countries have to finance these projects . If there are more options that increases the negotiation leverage for transparency. With fewer options, you see high unwillingness to push back. Another question has to do with this related issue, which has to do with the import of Chinese Workers to work on Infrastructure Projects in various countries. The level of this has changed over time, but nicole, who is a call at atlantic Council Colleague at Atlantic Council says it remains a significant factor in many recipient countries. How could this be addressed through the financing side of things . Gyude you were involved in public works. Perhaps you have addressed this issue on the ground. In my travel on the continent, the only place i saw this was in equatorial guinea. But there were circumstances that may have prompted that. Equatorial guinea chose at the last moment to host the au summit and needed to build quickly. They brought in a lot of chinese lenders. Because of the demographic issues in china, it is more expensive to have a chinese worker work in africa now than it was. Maybe that was the case up to 2008. But in my part of the world, i dont think that is an issue anymore. You still have four men and supervisors you might be chinese, but anywhere between 8590 of workers on Construction Projects tend to be locals. This is less of an issue than it has been presented as. You are starting to see the shift in two ways. One, i have seen certain countries push back by putting in requirements for a junior partner that is within the host country. Or requirements on the maximum chinese imported labor you can use. China recognizes they face headwinds. You see things like these workshops which are partnerships between Higher Education actors and china, and host institutions, training local labor forces to work on chinese project. Before we finish, is there anything anybody would like to add before we close . Quickly on the labor issue here. Back in 2021, in zurich, we reported on forced labor and smuggling traffic. [indiscernible] which implies the chinese authorized this. We have seen an increase of the socalled nontransparent exchange and use of laborers across different sectors. This also includes cases in east africa, where china is leading major investment project. This is an underreported and under regulated issue in some countries still. Well, we have sort of hit our limit. We started looking at things in the microcosm. At big picture issues then we brought it back down to earth at the end. This is a good place to stop. Obviously, it will be great to continue this conversation, but there is a lot more room to cover in the next day and a half. I would tell everyone there is going to be a 15minute break for a lederle lunch right now. [laughter] leisurely lunch right now. [laughter] and then i guess we will all reconvene around 1 00 or so. [applause] [inaudible] [inaudible conversations] cspan is your unfiltered view of government. Funded by this Television Companies and more including charter communications. Charter is proud to be recognized as one of the best internet providers are just Getting Started building 100,000 miles of new infrastructure to reach those who need it most. 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Cspan gives you a front row seat on how issues are debated and presented with no commentary, no interruptions and completely unfiltered. Cspan, your unfiltered view of government. Up next, remarks from several republican members of congress who spoke at the conservative action conference. First, House Judiciary Committee chair jim jordan