China owed more than $1 trillion in Belt and Road debt: report

China is owed more than a trillion dollars through its Belt and Road project, making it the biggest debt collector in the world, a report said this week, with an estimated 80 percent of the loans supporting countries in financial distress...

Crunching data compiled on Chinese financing of almost 21,000 projects across 165 countries, AidData said Beijing had now committed aid and credit "hovering around $80 billion a year" to low and middle-income nations...

"Beijing is navigating an unfamiliar and uncomfortable role -- as the world's largest official debt collector," the report said.. "Total outstanding debt -- including principal but excluding interest -- from borrowers in the developing world to China is at least $1.1 trillion," AidData said.. AidData, it added, "estimates that 80 percent of China's overseas lending portfolio in the developing world is currently supporting countries in financial distress"...

And AidData said China has in recent years suffered reputational damage among developing countries, with its approval rating falling from 56 percent in 2019 to 40 percent in 2021...

But a joint report this year by the World Bank and other institutions, including AidData, said Beijing had been forced to hand out billions of dollars in bailout loans to BRI countries in recent years...

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