On June 13, Astana hosted the 25th high-level meeting of Kazakh and Chinese leaders since the collapse of the Soviet Union. Kazakhstan’s President Nursultan Nazarbayev and his Chinese colleague Hu Jintao signed a declaration on strategic partnership, which provides for increased cooperation in a dozen areas, such as technological and scientific exchange, water management and culture. In his statement to the press, Hu referred to the joint plan of boosting bilateral trade expected to double by 2015, thus reaching the benchmark of US$ 40 billion. Kazakhstan’s leader also promised to start supplying China with nuclear tablets this year in order to better satisfy the ever-growing energy demand of Chinese industries.
Another important result of this bilateral meeting was the signing of an agreement between both countries’ national oil companies stipulating in concrete terms the construction of a third branch of the Turkmenistan-China gas pipeline, operational since 2009. According to the plan unveiled by Kairgeldy Kabyldin, president of Kazakhstan’s oil and gas flagship KazMunaiGaz, this branch will boost the overall throughput capacity of the pipeline. Another 25 billion cubic meters of gas will therefore be transported across thousands of kilometers starting in 2013.
The leaders of Kazakhstan and China were visibly generous in complimenting each other’s efforts to build an area of peace and prosperity in Central Asia based on jointly shared interests and common values. As proof of the strong bilateral relationship existing between the two capitals, Astana and Beijing decided to start using exclusively their national currencies for all kinds of transactions. This idea partly corresponds to Nazarbayev’s idea of a new financial and monetary system untied from the U.S. dollar and, instead, abutted by regional currencies in closely integrated economic blocks.
Two days later, both presidents took part in the 10th anniversary session of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization founded in 2001 for the purpose of tackling regional security issues and largely understood by most Western military experts as a counterweight to NATO. The other participating heads of state, namely the presidents of Russia, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan as well as the leaders of observer states, such as Pakistan and Afghanistan, were greeted at the Astana airport by Prime Minister Karim Massimov. Conversely, Nazarbayev personally welcomed his Chinese counterpart upon his arrival on Kazakh soil. According to some political commentators, this gesture confirms the importance of the Middle Kingdom for Kazakhstan’s crisis-stricken economy, practically bailed out by the Chinese as a result of two massive loans.
In their final declaration, the SCO summit participants urged the NATO-led international coalition to cease all its military activities in Libya, because “international crises and conflicts should be settled in a peaceful manner through political dialogue”. They also deplored the unilateral attempts of some nations to build up their missile defense systems “to the detriment of strategic stability and international security”. This statement, presumably inspired by Russia in its unresolved dispute with the U.S. over Washington’s missile defense plans in Eastern Europe, followed lack of progress at the latest G8 summit in Deauville, where the issue was discussed. The anti-U.S. stance relating to the Bush administration-brokered “missile defense shield” is also a priority for Beijing keen on preserving the status quo and preempting any attempts at interference in whatever country’s internal affairs.
Referring to the widespread use of electronic tools by organized crime and terrorist groups, Nazarbayev suggested ensuring an efficient cyber-security system with a view to prevent political destabilization at the national and regional levels. He also mentioned the U.S. experience in fighting cyber-terrorism and Internet-supported drug trafficking, but most observers believe that the president was actually responding to the recent string of popular revolutions in the Middle East and North Africa, dubbed the “Arab spring”. The SCO may now be used by its member states to guarantee medium- and long-term stability by upholding current regimes and depriving their opponents of powerful communication and mobilization tools. An independent decision to “shut off” from the outer world was recently taken in Belarus, which is considered a SCO partner and potential member.
Despite the expectations of a large number of political observers, the 10th SCO Summit did not produce any definitive decisions with regard to the membership of either India or Pakistan or Iran. The ever-present China-Russia rivalry is unlikely to permit a simultaneous rapprochement with New Delhi favored by Moscow and Islamabad supported by Beijing. The Iranian candidacy is all the more unlikely, given that Tehran is still under the pressure of international sanctions for its controversial nuclear program. As if to show their respect for the Iranian partner, Nazarbayev and Dmitry Medvedev had a special trilateral meeting with Mahmud Ahmadinejad, who had just denounced the “Western conspiracy” and proposed to oppose collaboration with the U.S.