Uzbekistan Meets the World on its Own Terms

By: Toh Han Shih

Foreign investment from countries including China is driving the rapid growth of Uzbekistan’s economy, but the Central Asian country does not intend to be a doormat for the US and China to fight over its abundant supply of critical minerals.

As the world has come to know, critical minerals are used in a range of products inseparable from the modern age. Central Asia holds huge deposits of critical minerals and rare earths such as manganese (38 percent of global reserves) and chrome (30.7 percent), with the largest reserves in Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan.

US President Donald Trump’s administration wants access to Uzbekistan’s bountiful critical mineral resources. In Washington, a delegation from Tashkent, led by Uzbek Foreign Minister Bakhtiyor Saidov, signed a memorandum of understanding with the US on critical minerals and rare earths in February 2026. US Secretary of State Marco Rubio plans to visit Central Asia later this year. In August, Uzbek President Shavkat Mirziyoyev gifted Trump with a pair of traditional Uzbek ayvans (hand-carved gazebos) that will be installed in West Potomac Park in Washington, the New York Times reported.

“Uzbekistan’s government welcomes foreign direct investment but wants to make sure other countries don’t dictate rules,” Odil Gafarov, deputy director of the Institute of Advanced International Studies in Tashkent, told Asia Sentinel.

“If we depend too much on one power, that superpower might be tempted to think they can do what they want to us,” Gafarov added. “We have to make other countries think twice about doing what they want, whether Russia, US, China or European countries.”

“We are increasing the military capability of our country. It’s not that we want to invade Kazakhstan. The reason is to make sure other countries don’t think of attacking us,” Gafarov stressed. “If we let other countries muscle in on us, then they will muscle in on us. That’s realpolitik.”

Since its independence from the former Soviet Union in 1991, Uzbekistan has deployed a multi-vector foreign policy. “We have strengthened relations with the US. It does not mean we will join with the US against China. It does not mean if we partner with China, it is directed against the US,” former Uzbek Foreign Minister Vladimir Norov told Asia Sentinel.

More investment

“The Trump government says they want to invest in rare earths, but we tell them the US must invest in other sectors as well. We demand joint ventures with US companies,” Gafarov said.

For example, the Uzbek government requires TMK, a 50-50 US-Uzbek joint venture in rare earth mining, to provide training for locals, Gafarov said. “The same goes for China. We buy police equipment from China, but we want China to provide police training.”

“We want Chinese and US companies to not only mine but produce products,” Norov said.

The Uzbek government seeks manufacturing jobs to support the country’s rapidly growing population, said Norov, the founding chief executive officer of Silk Road Advisory, a consultancy that helps Uzbek firms partner with foreign companies.

In 1991, at independence, the Uzbek population was 20 million; that has since doubled to 39.5 million, Norov pointed out. The population of Uzbekistan, the most populous Central Asian country, is expected to hit 60 million in 2060, Norov said.

Chinese companies are leaders in processing rare earths and can use artificial intelligence to mine rare earths, said Norov. It is important for Chinese companies to invest in rare earths in Uzbekistan, added Norov, who was secretary general of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) from January 2019 to December 2021.

The SCO is a Eurasian political, economic and security organization founded in Shanghai in June 2001. It has 10 member countries including China, Russia, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Iran and India.

Norov also welcomed recent overtures by the US.

In his LinkedIn account, Norov wrote in June 2026, “Marco Rubio’s planned visit to Central Asia in 2026 may become one of the most consequential US diplomatic engagements with the region in recent years.”

Norov waxed enthusiastically about the benefits of Rubio’s visit for Uzbekistan and other Central Asian states. “Washington is elevating Central Asia as a strategic economic and geopolitical partner,” Norov wrote.

“If we develop relations [with the US] it does not mean China will have less opportunity,” Norov told Asia Sentinel. “We seek mutually beneficial cooperations with all countries, including Japan, South Korea and Turkey. Our cooperation with these countries is growing rapidly.”

Access to the sea

As a landlocked nation, it is important for Uzbekistan to have access to seaports, said Norov. “So we want to have relations with Iran and China. The Iran war has a negative impact, but we are interested in developing relations with Iran because we are a landlocked country.”

“We developed pragmatic relations with Afghanistan despite Western sanctions [against Afghanistan],” he added.

This year, trade between Afghanistan and Uzbekistan will rise by $1 billion, while there are over 400 Afghan companies in a free trade zone in Uzbekistan, Norov said.

The Uzbek government wants to build a railway from Uzbekistan through Afghanistan to Peshawar in Pakistan, Norov said. Peshawar already has rail links with the Pakistani port cities of Gwadar and Karachi, so once a Uzbekistan-Peshawar railway is completed, Uzbekistan will have connections to ports in Pakistan, Norov explained, and China is interested in the rail project.

The first Uzbek president, Islam Karimov, was a close ally of the US for several years but that did not benefit the Uzbek economy, because Karimov ran a closed economy, Gafarov said.

When US forces invaded Afghanistan in retaliation for the 9/11 terror attacks in 2001, Karimov sided with the US, allowing American troops to use a base in the country for Afghan war operations. In 2005, when Karimov brutally suppressed an anti-government demonstration in the city of Andijan in Uzbekistan, subsequent Western criticism resulted in Karimov kicking the US military out of his country. This paved the way for China to increase its influence.

The Chinese presence is visible in Uzbekistan, with Chinese-language signs at the airport in the capital Tashkent. During my visit to Tashkent in August, I saw offices for BYD, the leading Chinese maker of electric vehicles, and Chinese workers wearing the uniforms of a Chinese state-owned construction firm.

Robust economic growth

China is the largest foreign investor in Uzbekistan, Norov said. Since the beginning of 2026, Chinese investment has surpassed $8 billion, according to the Uzbek government.

Over the 30 years from 1991, when the Central Asian nations gained independence, up to 2021, trade between China and these countries grew more than 100 times, according to China’s Ministry of Commerce. Trade in goods between China and Central Asia rose 12 percent to $106.3 billion in 2025. China became the largest trading partner of Central Asian countries for the first time in 2025.

China is also the biggest trading partner of Uzbekistan. In the first half of 2026, Uzbekistan was the top Central Asian nation in terms of trade with China, growing 31 percent year-on-year to $8.87 billion, according to the Uzbek government.

“It’s not the correct question to ask how much China has contributed to the Uzbek economy. It’s how much has the Uzbek government opened the economy,” said Gafarov.

Since Mirziyoyev succeeded Karimov as president in December 2016, Uzbekistan’s per capita GDP dropped from $2,271.50 in 2017 to $1,894.10 in 2018, then doubled to $3,968.30 in 2025, according to the World Bank.

Uzbekistan’s GDP grew 7.7 percent in 2025. The IMF expects GDP growth of 6.8 percent in 2026, but Norov predicts GDP growth at over 8 percent in 2026.

I saw signs of rapid progress during my trip to Tashkent. The subway stations and railway station reminded me of those in Beijing 25 years ago, and some neighbourhoods contain old Soviet-era buildings. However, Tashkent also has large shopping malls and new skyscrapers.

Mirziyoyev has reduced the poverty rate by two-thirds in the past 10 years, said Norov, to 5.8 percent in 2025.

About 2,000 Uzbek specialists have visited China to learn from China’s experience in lifting hundreds of millions of people out of poverty, Norov said. “The Uzbek president seeks to eliminate poverty.”

Toh Han Shih is a Singaporean writer in Hong Kong and a regular contributor to Asia Sentinel.