By P.K.Balachandran
Colombo, October 14: Has the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) that has been in existence since 2001, ever played a role in finding solutions to the members’ problems? Does it have anything to show for itself in all these years? Is it merely a talking shop?
These questions arise as top leaders of the SCO meet in Pakistan’s capital of Islamabad on October 15 and 16.
The Islamabad summit will be a meeting of the Council of the Heads of Government (CHG) of SCO member countries. The CHG is the second-highest decision-making body in the SCO The aim of the session is to advance regional economic cooperation, combat terrorism, address environmental issues and discuss measures to strengthen the organisation.
Nine of the 10 member states are being represented at the Prime-Ministerial level. Among the attendees will be Chinese Premier Li Qiang, Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin, Belarusian PM Roman Golovchenko and Iran’s First Vice President Reza Aref.
Kazakhstan’s Prime Minister Olzhas Bektenov, Kyrgyzstan’s Akylbek Japarov, Tajikistan’s Kohir Rasulzoda, and Uzbekistan’s Abdulla Aripov are also expected to participate. India’s Minister for External Affairs S. Jaishankar will represent his country.
Representatives from international organisations like the European Economic Community (EEC) and the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) are also expected to participate. The Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) is a regional intergovernmental organization in Eurasia. It was formed following the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991, and is its legal successor. It covers an area of 20,368,759 sq. km and has an estimated population of 239,796,010. Its headquarters are at Minsk in Belarus.
The CHG is expected to adopt key measures aimed at enhancing economic partnerships among member states and approving the SCO’s budget for the upcoming year. But the CHG is being held in trying circumstances with member countries battling domestic and international problems.
Issues
SCO members face a multiplicity of issues. Russia, a key member, is labouring under punishing US sanctions over its invasion of Ukraine and the SCO is not able to take a collective stand on it. China is being hounded by the US economically and militarily and SCO has nothing to say on it. China and India have a border problem in which SCO cannot intervene, just as it cannot interfere in the India-Pakistan dispute over cross border terrorism and over Kashmir.
Many in Pakistan and India were hoping that with Indian External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar attending the summit, steps would be taken to normalise India-Pakistan relations. But Jaishankar made it clear that he was going to Pakistan to attend an international conference and not to open a dialogue on India-Pakistan relations
Pakistan in Turmoil
Apart from the problems of the big powers, Pakistan, the venue of the meeting, is facing internal political violence and terrorism.
Last Thursday, gunmen of the Baloch Liberation Army (BLA) killed 20 miners in Balochistan province. The BLA launched multiple attacks in August that killed more than 50 in Musakhail district. Balochistan is home to several separatist groups who want independence form Pakistan. They accuse the federal government in Islamabad of unfairly exploiting oil and mineral-rich Balochistan at the expense of locals.
Last Sunday, the BLA carried out an attack on Chinese nationals outside Karachi airport. Two Chinese engineers were killed. There are thousands of Chinese working in the China-funded US$ 65 billion Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) projects. The BLA has asked Chinese workers to leave Balochistan. As a result, Pakistani authorities are curbing the movement of Chinese citizens during the SCO summit.
Last week, thousands of supporters of lmran Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaaf (PTI) party converged on Islamabad and fought with the police, demanding the former prime minister’s release from imprisonment and calling for stays on controversial constitutional amendments related to limiting the judiciary’s powers. The PTI is planning to hold a huge demonstration in Islamabad on the opening day of the summit.
Too Diverse
According to some analysts, the SCO is ineffective and irrelevant because it is too diverse. Temur Umarov of Carnegie Politika says that the SCO is little more than a talking shop. The SCO’s successes have been few and far between because each nation comes with its own baggage and tries to push its particular agenda.
China wants to pursue its infrastructure ambitions in Central Asia. India too is aiming at the same thing but without cooperating with China.
Russia wants to use the SCO to regain suzerainty over its erstwhile Central Asian Republics, but it is unable to do so because it is economically weak and is embroiled in costly and never-ending war against Ukraine. China is outbidding Russia in this field.
Umarov recalls that in 2008, after the Russian invasion of Georgia, the then Russian president Dmitry Medvedev raised the question of the independence of South Ossetia; in 2014, Russia sought recognition of the annexation of Crimea; and, in 2022, after the full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Moscow attempted to get SCO members to vote as a bloc at the United Nations. Russia’s efforts did not succeed.
The SCO’s Business Council has put on plenty of events, but not once in twenty years has it facilitated a significant business transaction between member states. The SCO’s Interbank Consortium does nothing apart from holding seminars, Umarov says.
If there’s one SCO organ that should operate effectively, it’s the Regional Anti-Terrorist Structure. “But that too does little more than help member states organize military exercises. When a major terrorist attack takes place in a member state, all that can be found on the Regional Anti-Terrorist Structure’s website are press releases expressing condolences,” Umarov points out.
Brighter Side
However, there is a brighter side to the SCO. Raffaello Pantucci, Director of International Security Studies at the Royal United Services Institute, lists the SCO’s advantages particularly from India’s point of view.
“Meetings of the SCO means that both Indian and Pakistani officials at a senior level will have to encounter each other at least once a year, away from the glare of the annual September UN General Assembly meeting. This will provide a neutral forum in which the two rival powers have an opportunity to interact,” Pantucci says.
Further: “Participation in SCO’s anti-terrorism structure (RATS) may bring some new levels of intelligence sharing and counter-terrorism strategies. The SCO gives India and China occasions to meet and iron out their differences. China-India relationship has been on a broadly positive trajectory for a while, notwithstanding the periodic border spats. China and India are able to hold constructive conversations on a wide range of issues, from AIIB membership to joint counter-terrorism exercises. The relationship is moving in a positive, though still slightly tentative, direction. And SCO meetings help this process.”
Central Asia is still untapped by India, though Indian soft power already has considerable influence in Central Asia, far more than China, Pantucci points out. “Bollywood movies are much enjoyed, compared with Chinese entertainment. But India has not found ways to profit from it.”
India is yet to flex its economic muscle in Central Asia. India can surely gain from access to Central Asia’s minerals and energy, as also market access to Russia and ultimately Europe. Central Asia is still deeply underdeveloped, offering an entree for Indian construction firms and others, Pantucci says.
The main problem for India is the physical impediment posed by disturbed Afghanistan and hostile Pakistan. India has sought to overcome this by developing the Chabahar Port in Iran – an alternative route for Indian products from Central Asia. But progress beyond Chabahar is not evident.
SCO membership will go some way towards changing the situation for the better but India will need to make a concerted effort if it is to capitalize effectively on the opportunities that Central Asia offers and successfully compete with China there, the scholar says.
The SCO, therefore, has its uses. And an obvious sign of this is that countries are making a beeline to join it. It is an expanding forum, whether it has solid achievements or not.
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