PESHAWAR – Pakistan is the latest nation struggling to repay Chinese loans extended under the Belt and Road Initiative, with indications emerging that Islamabad will soon seek to reschedule as much as $22 billion in outstanding power sector credits.

In recent years Chinese loans have fueled a massive buildout of Pakistan’s power generation, financing that has turned a perennial electricity shortfall into a now massive capacity surplus that the highly indebted nation can increasingly ill-afford.