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NAIROBI, April 13-- Almost six years after Chinese President Xi Jinping proposed the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), the grand vision for promoting common development through better connectivity among countries and regions has been morphing into a solution for speeding up global cooperation for greater prosperity. This is evidenced by the fact that 125 countries and 29 international organizations have so far signed cooperation agreements with China on jointly building the Belt and Road, according to data published in March on China's official Belt and Road web portal. But as global enthusiasm for and confidence in the BRI grow, some noises ensue, often with ill intentions to discourage its wide adoption and send misleading messages to nations who seek to benefit from BRI participation. One such message claims that the BRI pushes some countries into a "debt trap." PALE NOISES The situation on the ground, however, has shown that such noises are ill-founded. Researchers, economists, and policymakers in Africa, a region that has been warned to be wary of a so-called "debt trap" for participating in the BRI, regard such claims as mere negative speculations that seek to undermine the initiative, saying these claims should not be taken seriously. Firstly, developing countries apparently aspire to improve their dilapidated infrastructure and the BRI well meets such needs. Taking transport as a key example, Prof. Damian Gabagambi, managing director of Tanzania's National Development Corporation, said the BRI is highly strategic because transport networks in a country are like blood vessels in a human body. | 
