Pakistan is considering upgrading the constitutional status of its northern Gilgit-Baltistan region, which is also claimed by India, in a bid to provide legal cover to a multi-billion-dollar Chinese investment plan, officials said on January 7, 2016. The move will signal a historic shift in Pakistan's position on the future of the wider Kashmir region as it will grant the mountainous region greater legislative powers and control of its revenue, as well as send two lawmakers to the federal parliament for the first time -- albeit as observers. A top government official from Gilgit-Baltistan said the move was in response to concerns raised by Beijing about the China Pakistan Economic Corridor, an ambitious $46 billion infrastructure plan to link China's western city of Kashgar to the Pakistani port of Gwadar on the Arabian Sea. He said "China cannot afford to invest billions of dollars on a road that passes through a disputed territory claimed both by India and Pakistan." According to Pakistani strategic analyst Ayesha Siddiqa, the move could also demonstrate Islamabad's desire to end the Kashmir conflict by formally absorbing the territory it controls -- and, by extension, recognising New Delhi's claims to parts of the region it controls, such as the Kashmir Valley: "If we begin to absorb it so can India. It legitimises their absorption of the valley."