One year after the 2024 Student Uprising in Bangladesh, which saw the ousting of Sheikh Hasina after 15 years as Prime Minister, China has emerged as the biggest beneficiary from the new interim government. Dr. Muhammad Yunus, the chief advisor of the interim government, has presided over the nation of 180 million, but has failed to effectively follow through on his many promises, both domestic and international. Endemic issues such as lawlessness, rising inflation from the impact of tariffs, access to public goods, and political tensions between competing parties following the contentious ban of the Awami League—a questionable precedent for the 54-year-old parliamentary democracy—make the domestic situation in Bangladesh uncertain, especially with impending parliamentary elections set for February 2026.
On Dhaka’s foreign policy front, the shift away from India has been decisive, coinciding with new Chinese deals and development initiatives, rapprochement with Pakistan and balancing with Washington as evident in the recent tariff reductions from 37% to 20% on Aug. 1. More recent developments in South Asia, namely the new 50% tariffs on India over continued purchase of Russian oil coupled with Bangladesh’s interest to purchase 20 J-10CE fighter jets from China and Trump’s embrace of Pakistan in a White House lunch meeting with the Army Chief Asim Munir, following India’s poor aerial combat performance in their Kashmir conflict in May, further bolster China’s strategic position in South Asia.
While China has been at odds with India over border disputes, pushing New Delhi into deepening defense and economic ties with the US as a result, Trump’s unprecedented pressure campaign on India drives both Dhaka and New Delhi further toward Beijing in an unprecedented shift in power dynamics in the region.
In March 2025, Yunus’ visit to China marked a fundamental shift in Bangladesh-China relations as the unelected leader secured nine agreements with Beijing, including infrastructure projects, loans, and grants totaling $2.1 billion. Breaking with the tradition of newly elected Bangladeshi leaders making their first bilateral visit to India, Yunus’s decision to visit China first was considered the “most important visit” by a Bangladeshi leader to China by Yao Wen, China’s ambassador to Bangladesh. The interim government’s press secretary called the March trip a “grand success,” not just in symbolism but in substance: China’s zero-tariff market access and $23 billion worth of Bangladeshi exports comprised of leather, mangoes, jackfruits, and other agricultural products attest to the breakthrough in Dhaka-Beijing relations.
For Bangladesh, the $400 million modernization deal for the country’s second-largest seaport, the Mongla Port, in addition to increased engagement with the Teesta River Comprehensive Management and Restoration Project, stand as the most substantial deliverables. For China, the green light to construct facilities in the Mongla Port, a strategic location undercutting India’s influence in the Bay of Bengal, offers China a foothold over the Strait of Malacca chokepoint, which handles 33% of global trade and half the world’s container traffic. Hasina, it must be noted, also engaged in economic cooperation with Beijing, overseeing the period where China became Bangladesh’s largest trading partner and including the People’s Liberation Army-inaugurated BNS Sheikh Hasina base in Pekua in 2023, which fell under the radar of the US Indo-Pacific security concerns for China’s submarine diplomacy in the Bay of Bengal. However, Yunus’ more recent moves in the past year don’t signal a consideration to balance ties with India, as Hasina’s 15-year rule did.
Outside bilateral commitments between Dhaka and Beijing, the significant changes in US foreign aid as a result of US President Donald Trump’s dismantling of USAID has served as a window of opportunity which China decisively seized upon. On March 28, 50 out of the 59 USAID-funded projects were shut down as a result of a “stop-work” order issued by the Trump administration in the first month of his second tenure as president of the United States. Bangladesh lost over $700 million in development assistance, leading to over 50,000 development professionals losing jobs related to USAID projects and linked organizations.
Adopting the US Cold War soft power playbook, the second Trump administration’s severe cuts to development initiatives has contributed to China instead filling in the void as Beijing provided a $400 million budget support loan agreement through the Asian Investment Bank to Dhaka on June 23, 2025, for climate-resilient development. More recently, on Aug. 3, the Asian Development Bank and the government of Bangladesh signed a $150 million loan agreement to improve Technical and Vocational Education and Training (TVET) in order to increase access to employment and competitiveness in the global market. Chinese investment in Bangladesh totals $7.07 billion according to the American Enterprise Institute, with China releasing $4.45 billion for 35 projects under the Belt and Road Initiative. The strong presence of China as a development partner in South Asia is not exclusive to only Bangladesh, as six out of eight countries in South Asia are part of China’s Belt and Road Initiative, with Nepal, Sri Lanka and the Maldives being two other South Asian countries that have increased their engagement with China in the last decade.
2024 wouldn’t be the first time a geopolitical earthquake has prompted Bangladesh to distance itself from India, while getting closer to China. The aftermath of Sheikh Mujib’s assassination on Aug. 15, 1975, ushered in a similar trend, where China supported Dhaka’s admission to the United Nations the year prior and formally recognized the country, following the first Awami League head of state’s assassination on Oct. 4, 1975. Before rising to the presidency on April 21, 1977, Chief Martial Law Administrator Ziaur Rahman made the first high-level visit of a Bangladeshi leader to China in January 1977, after which the next Bangladeshi leader to visit China was Zia’s wife, later widow and successor to his Bangladesh Nationalist Party, Prime Minister Khaleda Zia in 2002. The depth of the BNP’s role in laying the groundwork for the Dhaka-Beijing relationship resurfaced in a meeting between a Bangladeshi delegation and the International Department of the Communist Party of China (IDCPC) in Beijing on Feb. 26, 2025. Consisting of leaders from eight political parties, students and journalists, the 21-member delegation met with Sun Haiyan, the Vice Minister of IDCPC, who stated that, “no matter what happens, our ties will remain strong and stable.” The BNP standing committee member, Dr. Moyeen Khan, attested the root of Dhaka-Beijing relations to the party founder, Ziaur Rahman, who he stated, “initiated a strategic relationship with China.” He added that, “after the liberation war, when our armed forces were virtually destroyed, China fully supported the reconstruction of our military.” In fact, between Bangladesh’s normalization of ties with China in 1975 and 1980, China supplied 78% of Bangladesh’s weapons, leading some experts to argue that Dhaka shifted from the Indo-Soviet axis to the Pakistan-China axis following 1975. To this day, China is the primary supplier of military hardware in Bangladesh, standing as Beijing’s second-largest buyer of Chinese weapons, purchasing 72% of its total arms from China between 2019 and 2023.
Similar to 1975, the student uprising of 2024 has resulted in a transition period where the current interim government is setting the stage for a more China-aligned, Awami League-averse government to take the reins after the February 2026 elections. With nearly $3 billion invested into Bangladesh since Hasina’s ousting, China has made the requisite political overtures to both the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) as the most viable contender to win the elections and Jamaat-e-Islaami (JeI), which has never held substantial influence, but has witnessed immense gains under the interim government’s loosening of bans and freeing of right-wing Islamist elements. Political alignment, economic cooperation and continued military imports exhibit a Bangladesh which is repeating a pattern the nation of 180 million witnessed after the assassination of the former prime minister’s father, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman. This time, however, Hasina lost grip of a country with a GDP ($450 billion) 23 times higher than what her father left it, but with geostrategic significance and a continually engaged youth demographic which together commanded just as much trouble for the outgoing regime.
PacNet commentaries and responses represent the views of the respective authors. Alternative viewpoints are always welcomed and encouraged.
Rimon Tanvir Hossain ([email protected]) is a PhD student in Political Science at UCLA and a current Young Leader at the Pacific Forum
Photo: Protesters climb a public monument as they celebrate after getting the news of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s resignation, in Dhaka, Bangladesh, Aug. 5, 2024 || Credit: Rajib Dhar via AP Photo