Polar “Silk Road”: The “Dragon” Conquers the Arctic

According to Wang Jun, Acting Consul General of China in Vladivostok, the continuation of Arctic cooperation is important for both countries.

The South China Morning Post (SCMP) quoted Denis Makarov, Director of the Institute of Oceanology, who noted that the Russian-Chinese research will help create models of ocean and climate evolution in order to better predict the impact of current and future climate change on regional marine ecosystems, fisheries, transport, and other related fields.

The expedition, the ninth for the two countries and the first since the pandemic, departed from Vladivostok to study the effects of climate change on the deep-sea environment.

The 45-day mission will conduct environmental research in the Bering Sea and the northwestern Pacific Ocean. Chinese and Russian scientists will jointly study the life of the Pacific Ocean over the past 126,000 years—a geological period known as the Late Quaternary.

Since the launch of joint expeditions in 2010, a total of 110 Chinese scientists have participated. The research areas have continuously expanded to include not only the Sea of Japan (known in China as the East Sea), the Sea of Okhotsk, and the Bering Sea, but also several Arctic regions, including the Chukchi, East Siberian, Laptev, and Kara Seas.

In addition to marine expeditions, the two countries have collaborated on other projects. In 2009, the first Sino-Russian Symposium on Marine Science Research was held in Qingdao, attended by more than 120 scientists from 25 Russian and Chinese research institutes.

In 2017, the First Institute of Oceanography of China’s Ministry of Natural Resources and the Pacific Oceanological Institute of the Russian Academy of Sciences established a Joint Research Center for Oceanography and Climate.

Last year, the two countries reached an agreement to establish a subcommittee for cooperation on the Northern Sea Route (NSR).

The Northern Sea Route is Extremely Important for China — Not Only Economically, but Also Geopolitically. China, which has long sought to establish itself as a power in the Arctic, is interested in developing shipping and building a fleet of icebreakers.

According to China’s Ministry of Transport, the development of the Northern Sea Route is one of the country’s absolute transport priorities. After all, this route reduces both the time and cost of cargo transportation between Asia and Europe. Furthermore, the Northern Sea Route opens access to the Arctic’s inexhaustible natural resources. Joint development of these resources with Russia will help boost the economies of both countries.

As early as 2018, the National Development and Reform Commission presented its “Polar Silk Road” plan as a supplement to Xi Jinping’s Belt and Road Initiative. The essence of the project is as follows: in addition to the Northern Sea Route, Beijing is considering two other Arctic routes — the Northwest Passage (which primarily runs through Canadian waters) and a potential Transpolar Route (crossing the North Pole).

The Arctic is becoming an increasingly important strategic region due to melting ice, the opening of new shipping routes, and opportunities for exploiting natural resources. It is therefore not surprising that, alongside scientific research and commercial shipping, one of China’s priorities in the Arctic is also the protection of its maritime interests. After all, abundant natural resources must be safeguarded.

This is yet another project on which Russia and China are working together, according to Reuters. In October last year, for the first time in history, the Chinese Coast Guard joined Russia in patrolling the route from the northern Pacific to the Arctic Ocean.

This was followed by joint naval exercises in the Arctic, which not only alarmed the West but, judging by reports in English-language media, were deeply shocking. Indeed, the Russian-Chinese alliance in the Arctic leaves little room for other global players.

Although China lies 1,400 kilometers south of the Arctic Circle, it has rarely allowed such details to hinder its ambitions. In 2018, it declared itself a “near-Arctic state” and announced plans to become a “polar great power” by 2030. This goal was reaffirmed three years later in the 14th Five-Year Plan of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), which pledged “practical cooperation in the Arctic” and the development of the “Polar Silk Road.”

China has a strategic imperative to develop the Northern Sea Route, Modern Diplomacy reports. According to some analysts, the route will be ice-free by 2050 due to rising temperatures — a prospect that has drawn the greatest attention from both China and Russia.

Although China has no direct border with the Arctic Ocean, under international law it is permitted to conduct transoceanic scientific research. China is geographically close to the Arctic and is among the continental states nearest to the Arctic Circle, as every climate-related issue has distinct impacts on China.

China plans to build a “Polar Silk Road” to connect the country with the West via the Northern Sea Route. Following the publication of its White Paper on Arctic Policy in 2018, China announced that it would make the Arctic Ocean part of the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) to establish the “Polar Silk Road.”

According to the White Paper, China aims to contribute to the protection, development, and participation in the Arctic Council. However, China is not a permanent member of the Council — it obtained observer status in 2013. Another objective of China’s Arctic strategy is the construction of a “Polar Silk Road” in the north to connect Europe and Asia. This represents an extension of the BRI into the Arctic through the construction of roads, ports, and other infrastructure.

It is important to note that 90 percent of China’s trade is conducted via maritime routes. According to China’s State Oceanic Administration, the 21st century is considered the “century of the oceans,” underscoring the importance of the seas for the Chinese nation.

After Western sanctions were imposed on Russia following the Ukraine crisis in 2014, Moscow and Beijing expanded their cooperation and became closer strategic allies. China has also strengthened its relations with other Arctic countries such as Iceland and Greenland.

To extend its influence and physical presence in the region, China needs a long-term partner — and it has preferred Russia for cooperation and strategic alignment in the Arctic due to Russia’s geographic proximity and its opposition to the West.

In 2014, China began investing in the Yamal Project — the “crown jewel” of Moscow’s Arctic ambitions — located on Russia’s Yamal Peninsula. The project involves the extraction of liquefied natural gas (LNG), with an annual capacity of 25 billion cubic meters of natural gas. In 2016, a Chinese bank invested USD 12 billion in the project to deepen cooperation with the Russian government.

China continues to strengthen strategic cooperation with Russia due to its influence in the Arctic Council, and the Yamal Project is considered the first major project of the “Polar Silk Road.”

The project culminates in the port city of Sabetta, where Chinese companies have built not only the port itself but also the Sabetta International Airport and the Bovanenkovo–Sabetta railway, which connects western Siberia with the Arctic coast. In the first case, China Communications Company partnered with Russian Titanium Resources to develop a vast titanium deposit. This

project also includes the construction of a railway linking Sosnogorsk with Indiga on the Barents Sea, as well as the expansion of Indiga’s deep-water port.

 

Outside Russia, China does not own any ports in the European or North American Arctic, but its influence manifests in other ways. Hutchison Ports, a Hong Kong–based company, operates the container terminal at Stockholm Norvik Port, a vital hub in the region’s logistics network. In 2023, the ports of Gothenburg and Shenzhen formalized a sister-port agreement, officially aimed at promoting sustainable transport and increasing trade volume — though such agreements often serve broader strategic purposes.

China’s growing influence in the Arctic underscores the importance of the oceans for Beijing, as China positions itself as a global power challenging U.S. influence. Although the nearest part of China lies only 900 miles from the Arctic Circle, Beijing continues to strengthen its ties with Arctic nations.

Aside from Russia, other Arctic states such as Finland, Sweden, and Iceland are allied with the United States and enjoy its security guarantees, with Finland, Sweden, and Iceland all being NATO members. Moreover, China has established two research stations in the Arctic — one in Norway’s Svalbard archipelago and another in Iceland.

However, other countries, including the United States, have expressed serious concerns about China’s presence in the Arctic region. In fact, China seeks to deepen its strategic partnership with Russia to secure access to the Arctic and to establish a shorter trade route to Europe.

The global significance of the Arctic region has increasingly been driven by its geopolitical, strategic, and geoeconomic importance. Melting ice caused by climate change has prompted nations to consider the exploration of the region’s vast untapped resources. China has emerged as a key player, becoming a permanent observer of the Arctic Council. It plans to launch the Polar Silk Road to connect Asia and Europe. Furthermore, China seeks access to the abundant natural resources of the Arctic Ocean — including gas, oil, and minerals. Rising temperatures and melting ice are also opening new navigation routes for trade and shipping, securing China’s economic interests in the region.

China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), a massive global infrastructure and trade project, is closely linked to its Arctic ambitions. The country aims to extend the BRI northward by establishing the Polar Silk Road to shorten trade distances between Europe and Asia. Beijing has stated that China will engage in “pragmatic cooperation” in the Arctic and contribute to building the Polar Silk Road across the Arctic Ocean.

Moreover, China’s involvement in Arctic affairs reflects its broader ambition to act as a global leader. Its Arctic ambitions are tied to China’s geopolitical strategy to balance the existing international order. The Polar Silk Road is not only about trade — it also demonstrates the potential for new powers to expand their influence and project strength in emerging strategic areas like the Arctic.

This Chinese expansion has raised concerns among traditional Arctic powers, which see Beijing as a potential challenge to their interests and sovereignty in the region. The European Union officially recognized China as a “strategic rival” in 2019. The United States pressured Denmark to reject China’s offer to help build airports in Greenland and subsequently promised U.S. investment in the same projects. Denmark also blocked China in 2016 from purchasing a decommissioned military installation in Greenland.

China continues to work consistently to strengthen its ties with European countries, particularly those with Arctic territories. As the Arctic region undergoes transformation, the world is closely watching China’s actions and ambitions — and how they will shape the Arctic’s future.

The upcoming 15th Five-Year Plan (2026–2030) is expected to expand these efforts, placing special emphasis on what Beijing calls the “ice and snow economy” — a broad term encompassing everything from scientific research and maritime access to, most notably, tourism and culture, according to Gisreport.

The Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) White Paper on Arctic Policy from 2018 — which made the controversial claim that China is a “near-Arctic state” — also stressed that developments in the region have a “vital impact” on the country’s national interests. At the time, those interests were largely framed in terms of environmental protection and scientific research — justifications that have since facilitated Beijing’s growing Arctic presence. Officially, the goal is to ensure the “sustainability of environmental protection, resource utilization, and human activity.”

However, China’s Arctic research missions often include oceanographic surveys and acoustic modeling — activities that mirror the CCP’s operations in the South China Sea, where mapping the seabed played a key role in the strategic positioning of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA).

Since 2018, China’s polar programs have been overseen primarily by the Ministry of Natural Resources — the same body responsible for its research in the South China Sea. The overlap between Arctic science and the PLA is not coincidental. It reflects the doctrine of military-civil fusion — the principle that China’s civilian and commercial sectors must serve the CCP’s national security objectives.

Military-civil fusion is not new; its earliest versions were developed under Mao Zedong. However, under President Xi Jinping, it has become a central pillar of China’s state strategy.

A 2020 edition of The Science of Military Strategy — the PLA’s core doctrinal publication — explicitly highlights this connection in China’s Arctic activities:

“The integration of the military and civilian sectors is the main means by which great powers achieve a polar presence,” it states, encouraging China to “fully utilize the role of military forces in polar scientific research.”

China’s Arctic ambitions have expanded significantly since 2022, largely driven by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Western sanctions have restricted Moscow’s access to foreign satellite imagery, for example, and other technologies essential for Arctic navigation, forcing Russia to rely increasingly—though cautiously—on Beijing. This shift is reflected in Russia’s revised Arctic policy of 2023, which abandoned its previous emphasis on multilateral cooperation within the Arctic Council in favor of “relations with foreign states on a bilateral basis.”

However, it would be a mistake to attribute China’s expansion in the region solely to Russia’s difficulties. Beijing has been steadily consolidating its presence in the Arctic through membership in organizations such as the European Incoherent Scatter Scientific Association, which operates Arctic radar systems with both scientific and defense applications, as well as through targeted investments in key dual-use infrastructure across the European Arctic.

A large portion of these capacities is concentrated in Norway, Sweden, Finland, and especially Russia, where Chinese companies have participated in the construction of bridges, railways, metro and suburban train systems, and energy infrastructure. Much of this activity is focused along the Northern Sea Route (NSR), the Arctic passage running through Russia’s exclusive economic zone from the Baltic to the Bering Sea, where melting ice is continuously expanding the window for maritime navigation.

Already, a voyage from Dalian, China, to Rotterdam, the Netherlands, via the NSR takes 33 days, compared to 48 days through the Suez Canal. But for Beijing, the appeal of the NSR extends beyond logistics. The corridor offers an alternative route to the Suez, the South China Sea, and—crucially—the Strait of Malacca, a chokepoint so strategically burdened that former President Hu Jintao once described China’s dependence on it as the “Malacca Dilemma.”

Beijing’s investments along the NSR reflect this strategic calculation. China has invested $300 million in a coal terminal in Murmansk and signed an agreement to develop a deep-water port in Arkhangelsk, on the White Sea.

 

China’s presence also extends to critical infrastructure. In Sweden, China Railways Group, through its subsidiary China Railway Tunnel Group, has been involved in constructing tunnels for the expansion of the Stockholm metro. By 2024, MTR Corporation, also headquartered in Hong

Kong, was operating parts of the city’s metro and suburban rail network. In Norway, the Sichuan Road & Bridge Group built the Hålogaland and Beitstad bridges, completed in 2018 and 2022 respectively. Meanwhile, in Finland, the China Investment Corporation has managed over one million square meters of logistics real estate since 2017, including facilities at Helsinki’s Vuosaari port, the Kouvola rail logistics center, and logistics and warehouse space at Helsinki-Vantaa Airport.

 

 

Although China is not among the countries bordering the Arctic, it has recognized the significance and the resources that the Arctic and the Arctic Ocean possess. Since Chinese authorities have limited access to the Arctic through European countries and the United States, China has intensified its cooperation with Russia in the Arctic region following the start of the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

Securing an additional maritime route for exporting Chinese goods to Europe is not the only motive behind China’s interest in the Arctic. The region is rich in resources—oil, natural gas, minerals, and rare metals—making it highly attractive for exploitation, both for Russia and for China.

Furthermore, China’s growing interest in the Arctic also carries geopolitical implications, considering one of its strategic geopolitical goals: reshaping the global world order and establishing what China (and, more recently, Russia) refers to as a multipolar world order.