Thank you.
Thank you, sir, for your testimony.
I want to go back to the role that China is playing and the emerging role, if you will, of China in this particular area.
It's trite but true that power abhors a vacuum. For all the huffing and puffing by the Russians, they are, in some respects, masking a serious economic and demographic decline. There is actual population shrinkage. That makes them dangerous, but it also makes them vulnerable. The Chinese, on the other hand, are exactly the opposite. They are a growing economic power and they are starting to assert their influence.
I just want you to comment on two areas. First, do you see a larger game plan on the part of the Chinese government in that particular area, aside from simply economic influence?
Second, the Chinese government has been in continuous conflict with the Uighurs, a Muslim group of people in the west of China, which I assume receives some comfort from some of the central Asian republics as well. I wonder whether you could offer any observations with respect to those two things: the underlying agenda of the Chinese government and its relationship with Islamic people in its own country, and also with those in central Asian republics.