When a foreign counterparty resists in a way that does not track to any commercial logic, the instinct is to route around it. Find another ministry, another partner, another entry point. Escalate to someone more senior. Add capital.
That instinct is where a great many cross-border projects go to stall.
Why the obstacle is not irrational
Resistance that appears irrational from outside is almost always rational from inside, given information the outside party does not have. The relevant history might be an earlier foreign investment that went badly and cost an official their position. It might be a domestic political commitment that makes a particular structure impossible to approve this year but routine next year. It might be that the proposal, as phrased, requires the counterparty to concede something publicly that they cannot concede publicly.
None of that appears in a data room. It also does not respond to pressure, because pressure does not change the underlying constraint — it only raises the cost of explaining the constraint to you.
What routing around costs
Going to a different ministry usually means the first one hears about it, and now you have an institution with a reason to be unhelpful. Escalating over someone's head resolves the immediate blockage and creates a permanent one. Adding capital signals that the constraint is being treated as a price, which is often precisely the reading that caused the resistance.
The routes around an obstacle tend to be shorter in the first month and considerably longer over the life of the project.
What working through it involves
It is slower at the start. It means establishing what the actual constraint is, which usually requires someone the counterparty will speak candidly to — and candour is a function of standing, not of seniority or persistence.
Then it means restructuring the proposition so that agreeing to it does not require the counterparty to do the thing they cannot do. Frequently the same commercial outcome is available in a form that is politically survivable, and nobody had asked what that form was.
The general rule
If a counterparty's position does not make sense, the most likely explanation is not that they are being difficult. It is that you are missing a constraint they have not told you about, and they may have good reasons for not telling you.
Finding out what it is takes longer than routing around it. It also tends to be the difference between a project that operates and a project that is still in development three years later.