BEIJING, Dec 29 (INP): Chinese experts have said highway built in northern Pakistan will help to boot trade and also reduce terrorism. Wang Yiwei, director of the Institute of International Affairs of Renmin University of China while talking to Chinese media has said “the CPEC is a flagship project of the Belt and Road Initiative. China hopes it can link China’s Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region to the Indian Ocean to not only boost economic growth but also fundamentally address terrorist and extremist-related issues through creating opportunities for development.” Wang further said that tor Pakistan and also the entire region, China has wide-ranging ambitions to help Pakistan develop into a middle-income country. Hu Zhiyong, a research fellow at the Institute of International Relations of the Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences has said “this is a great achievement of the Belt and Road Initiative in Pakistan and is very significant for the country’s social development prospects.” “The highway will provide cost-effective transportation to millions of local people in towns and valleys along the highway,” he added. The 47-kilometer-long segment of the highway that was formally opened by Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbassi was completed on schedule in less than three years. It is an important section of the CPEC, an infrastructure modernization project that links China and Pakistan. The highway is the second motorway project in Pakistan’s Khyber Pakhtunkhawa province after the M-1 motorway built linking Peshawar to Islamabad. INP/OBD/AJ