CHINA’S POLICY WITHIN THE SHANGHAI COOPERATION ORGANIZATION
Abstract
The Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) as a new international institute has gained a firm foothold in the political life of Central Asian countries. Several large projects are currently being implemented under the SCO’s auspices that can bring far-reaching changes in the region, eventually altering the balance of forces on the Eurasian continent in favor of China. The SCO’s especially promising projects include a SCO free trade area, to be created by 2020, and a regional antiterrorism structure, the first of a kind in the Central Asian region. Furthermore, the SCO has started showing ambitions of a political player whose interests extend beyond the collective national interests of its member countries and have a pronounced geopolitical character.
The Organization is striving to encompass the key areas of activity in Central Asia, at the same time working to consolidate the member countries’ foreign policy efforts in dealing with common tasks (one example of such cooperation is the decision to bring the SCO into the peace process in Afghanistan). As of late, the Organization has been taking practical steps to become a system-forming factor, a paradigm of regional development ensuring conditions for the advancement of the Central Asian region—its security and effective interaction between its member states. There is good reason to suggest that without the SCO, these two factors in Central Asia’s development would be less organized: Both security and multipartite cooperation required the establishment of a “center of gravity” in the region, such as the SCO.
Today, the SCO is also an important factor in a general restructuring of interstate cooperation mechanisms, political configuration and the security situation in Central Asia, as the groundwork for a new economy is being laid. A multilateral economic and security interaction mechanism that is evolving within the SCO has a positive impact on the development of relations be-tween individual member countries, as well as their interaction with extra-regional players and other international organizations. These relations are being built on what is seen as collective priorities. But taking into account the real role of China and Russia, the SCO initiatives require a more thorough analysis.
Alongside the changes in interaction between countries in the region, the SCO has yet another important effect on the Central Asian republics and the world as a whole. The SCO “introduces” China to Central Asia as an inalienable element of regional politics and economics, strengthening its positions, and considering the SCO’s ambitions and its potential as a global organization, it also provides a major channel for China in its aspiration for the role of a new regional and global power.
Today Beijing has entered an active phase of using the SCO in its own interests, attempting to change the geopolitical balance and the system of internal and external relations in the Central Asian republics that have evolved over the 15 years since the disintegration of the U.S.S.R. Kazakhstan is actively involved in the SCO project, proceeding from its own national interests; but from every indication, the continuation of the “Shanghai process” will have a not entirely favorable impact on Kazakhstan’s security. The negative trends that are evolving with respect to the Republic of Kazakhstan stem from the place that the PRC is striving to take in the Central Asian region, as well as the goals that the Chinese side has set itself, and that it intends to achieve through the SCO.
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