China's Belt and Road stirs up local anxieties

KHORGOS, Kazakhstan -- In late June, workers were busy transhipping freight from the Xinjiang region in northwest China at a Kazakhstan national railway station in the border town of Khorgos. Three cranes were operating nonstop, moving containers onto Kazakh freight cars. A buffer stop on a track bore a Chinese national flag, as if to emphasize Kazakhstan's close ties with its big neighbor to the southeast.