One of the most striking economic trends in Europe over the past decade has been China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). For countries with limited resources or underdeveloped infrastructure, it has opened doors long shut — bringing long-awaited funds for roads, ports, railways, and energy projects that had languished for years without financing. Yet, as is so often the case when big money enters the picture, these investments have also ushered in a fresh wave of political, strategic, and institutional risks.
It is hardly a secret that large-scale infrastructure projects — now as in the past — are potent tools of influence, the currency of “infrastructure diplomacy.” In the case of Chinese investment in Europe, an increasingly urgent question is emerging: where is the line between a mutually beneficial opportunity and a new form of systemic corruption, in which infrastructure becomes both an economic and a political lever?
To understand the mechanics of Chinese “infrastructure diplomacy,” one must look closely at how the model operates in Europe. A familiar pattern emerges: Chinese state-owned or affiliated corporations secure the construction contracts, which are financed by loans from Chinese export banks. A typical loan condition is that the borrowing country must hire Chinese contractors exclusively. On paper, this expedites delivery. In practice, it slashes competition — and opens ample room for “non-transparent” arrangements. In cooperation with local intermediaries close to political elites, such schemes can evolve into entrenched channels for rent-seeking and cementing political loyalties.
Over the past several years, Europe has seen no shortage of cases in which international investigative journalism and think-tank reports have flagged opacity and potential corruption.
The Bar–Boljare motorway in Montenegro has become a cautionary tale of debt dependency. Launched in 2015 with a loan from China’s Exim Bank and a contract awarded to the China Communications Construction Company (CCCC), the project aimed to link the port city of Bar with the Serbian border. The total motorway, roughly 170 kilometers, was budgeted at €1.5–2 billion, citing geological challenges and financing terms. Yet only a fraction has been built: initial junctions near Bar and a 41-kilometer segment from Lastva to Smokovac, priced at roughly €810 million. The most difficult — and expensive — mountain sections remain on the drawing board. The Chinese loan jump-started construction, but without an open tender or clear economic rationale. The result: a sharp rise in national debt and contractual terms favorable to the contractor, not necessarily to the state.
In Greece, the acquisition of a majority stake in the Port of Piraeus by China’s COSCO has transformed the harbor into a key logistics hub. In 2016, COSCO purchased 51% of shares from the Hellenic Republic Asset Development Fund for €280.5 million, with an option to buy a further 16% within five years. While not an outright case of corruption, the deal underscores strategic influence: control of critical infrastructure has bolstered China’s regional economic and political presence. Yet the terms of concessions and investment obligations have repeatedly sparked debates about transparency.
In Central Europe, the activities of the ostensibly private China Energy Company Limited (CEFC) were marked by scandal. Originally a commodity trader, CEFC expanded aggressively abroad into banking, real estate, and direct corporate acquisitions. In Europe, operating through CEFC Europe, it pursued deals at high speed, often via intermediaries and offshore structures, with little clarity about ultimate ownership. Journalists and analysts noted the purchase of strategic assets with minimal public scrutiny, alongside unusually close ties between CEFC executives and certain politicians and bureaucrats. Though not a state enterprise, CEFC’s modus operandi reflected the logic of political expansion.
In Hungary, the planned campus of Shanghai’s Fudan University in Budapest ignited political controversy. Approved around 2019–2020, the project was framed as a flagship for academic cooperation, drawing students from Central and Eastern Europe and bolstering Hungary’s status as an educational hub. Yet from the outset, the plan followed a familiar Chinese-project template: fast-tracked decisions, minimal public consultation, and opaque contractual details. Critics warned that major contracts could be awarded without transparency, with the bill ultimately falling to taxpayers.
Taken together, these cases reveal recurring hallmarks: loans tied to specific contractors; limited or purely formal tenders; chains of intermediaries and offshore entities that obscure ultimate beneficiaries; weak public oversight; and vulnerable anti-corruption institutions. In such an environment, major Chinese infrastructure projects can serve less as engines of growth and more as channels for political leverage and elite enrichment.
Even a single corruption scandal can undermine trust in government. But when such patterns become systemic, they reshape a country’s political economy: critical infrastructure falls under foreign control, political autonomy erodes, and resources meant for public needs are siphoned into private hands. For EU member states — and for the Union as a whole — this is a threat from within, weakening democratic institutions and eroding the capacity for a coherent foreign policy.
The answer is not isolationism but enforcement of rigorous standards at every stage — from project conception to completion. That means mandatory publication of contract terms and loan agreements; security and conflict-of-interest screening for foreign investments; bans on opaque intermediary structures; robust support for investigative journalism; and contractual clauses imposing penalties for corrupt practices.
Chinese investment can and should play a constructive role in Europe’s infrastructure renewal, job creation, and connectivity. But as recent history shows, in countries with weak institutions and lax oversight, such investments risk becoming instruments of political dependency and opaque enrichment. If they are to truly serve the public interest, Europe’s openness must be matched by uncompromising transparency and anti-corruption safeguards.