Montenegro’s motorway to nowhere

Arching out across a quiet Balkan valley, Montenegro’s first motorway cuts across the rocky scrubland with unnatural precision: a modernist stroke of concrete that gleams against the stony outcrops of the Dinaric Alps. Hung on one of the vast grey pillars is the country’s distinctive crimson banner, a golden two-headed eagle at its centre. The project may bear a symbol of the young post-communist state but those living in the village beneath know who’s really behind the motorway. The Socialist Republic of Yugoslavia has faded but the communists are back.

Montenegro is struggling to repay a £860 million Chinese loan for the highway’s construction, built to connect the port of Bar with neighbouring Serbia. Much of the project remains incomplete. Now the country’s debt has inflated to 103 per cent of GDP, with Beijing owning nearly a fifth of its total loan book.

It was hoped that the motorway would prove a vital regional trade link.