Paulo Duarte is Assistant Professor at the Universidade Lusófona do Porto. He received his PhD from Catholic University of Louvain. His research focuses on China¿s Belt and Road Initiative and in Central Asia, where he carried out an extensive on-the-ground research (Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan). Recent publications include: Duarte, P. and Ferreira-Pereira, L.C. (2021). ¿The Soft Power of China and the European Union in the context of the Belt and Road Initiative and Global Strategy¿. Journal of Contemporary European Studies, DOI: 10.1080/14782804.2021.1916740 Duarte, P. (2018). Whose Silk Road? The Chinese, US, European Union and Russian strategic projects for regional integration in Central Asia, 38-49. In Mendes, C. (2018). The New Silk Road in the Context of East Asian Relations and Wider International Implications. Routledge.