China’s surveillance state has eyes on Central Asia

AKIPRESS.COM - China's advanced surveillance regime is taking root along the length of the Belt and Road-especially the Belt, the overland Eurasian routes that were the origin of the government's ambitious investment project, the FP reports.
Recently, Kyrgyzstan opened a new police command center in its capital, Bishkek, putting its new facial recognition cameras to work. The equipment was supplied-reportedly free of charge-by the China National Electronics Import and Export Corporation, a defense company currently sanctioned by the United States.
The initiative is part of Bishkek's emerging effort to become a so-called smart city-a catchall term for cities with advanced data-processing capabilities. Such projects are being implemented across the region with help from China.
This April, Huawei closed a $1 billion deal with Uzbekistan to build a traffic-monitoring system involving some 883 cameras. Meanwhile Hikvision-another Chinese company under U.S. sanctions that advertises its ability to spot the faces of members of the Uighur minority in crowds-supplies major urban centers across Kazakhstan, including Almaty and Shymkent. Kazakhstan has been experimenting with developing smart cities since 2017.