SCO — the NATO of the East — holds summit in Shanghai. Tehran wants in
It’s been called “the NATO of the East,” “the new Warsaw Pact,” and “the dictator’s club.” The Shanghai Cooperation Organisation — China, Russia, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan —held its
fifth annual summit last week in the Chinese metropolis for heads of state from
member countries. The choice of Shanghai, where the SCO Secretariat is located,
also marks the tenth anniversary of the founding of the Shanghai Five, the organization
from which SCO was formed when Uzbekistan joined in 2001 and the group changed
its name. And now—much to Washington’s dismay—it may be Iran’s turn. Western media
normally ignore the SCO as if it didn’t exist, but the Shanghai summit has received
an unusual amount of Western media attention thanks to the participation of Iranian
president Mahmoud Ahmedinejad.
Tehran wants SCO support in its standoff with US. Iran already participates in SCO as an “observer” along with Pakistan, India
and Mongolia. But Tehran has now requested full-fledged membership in the Organisation
as soon as possible. Their reasons are obvious: they hope to reinforce ties with
the Chinese and Russians in their diplomatic showdown with the US and the west.
The request has placed all SCO member states in an awkward position. They have
put off the difficult decision for the time being.
Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan reacted coolly. Russia hasn’t responded
to avoid angering the White House (which is already furious over the Russian sale
to Iran of 29 highly sophisticated Tor-M1 anti-aircraft missiles). By contrast,
the anti-American Uzbekistani regime of Islam Karimov greeted the request with
evident enthusiasm. Last year, Karimov shut down the Karshi-Khanabad air base
with SCO’s approval in retaliation for US criticism of the Andijan massacre. But
China was similarly upbeat. The Chinese are in desperate need of Iranian oil and
natural gas and they have vigorously defended Iran against US accusations and
threats.
Peking defends itself against Washington’s annoyed reaction. When Washington got word of Tehran’s request to join SCO, an annoyed Bush administration
wasted no time responding. On June 3, Donald Rumsfeld described it as “passing
strange that one would want to bring into an organization that says it’s against
terrorism one of the nations that’s the leading terrorist nation in the world
… supporting Hamas … supporting Hezbollah, it has a long record of being engaged
in terrorist activities. And to think that they should be brought into an organization
with the hope that it would contribute to an anti-terrorist activity strikes me
as unusual.” Three days later, SCO Secretary General and Chinese Vice premier
and Foreign Minister Zhang Deguang declared that the “Shanghai Organisation will
not tolerate direct accusations of this sort against its members,” and affirmed
that “SCO would never have granted observer nation status to a country that sponsors
terrorism.”
Iran not on today’s official agenda. Presidents Hu Jintao of China, Vladimir Putin of Russia, Islam Karimov of Uzbekistan,
Nursultan Nazarbayev of Kazakhstan, Kurmanbek Bakiyev of Kyrgyzstan and Imomali
Rakhmonov of Tajikistan will discuss energy policy, economic and military cooperation.
Iran is not an item on the official agenda. But it seems likely that Iran’s request
will be the topic of informal discussions in the hall, certainly when Hu Jintao
and Ahmedinejad come face to face.
Enrico Piovesana
