Turkmenistan Sticks to Non-Aligned Stance
Turkmenistan Sticks to Non-Aligned Stance
Despite a recent flurry of diplomatic activity with other former Soviet states, Turkmenistan is in no hurry to start joining regional groupings. NBCentralAsia experts says the country is likely to continue keeping its distance with observer status only in these organisations.
Political analysts started speculating about a possible rapprochement after President Gurbanguly Berdymuhammedov held talks with his counterparts in the Commonwealth of Independent States, CIS, the Turkmen military participated in a meeting of CIS border guard commanders, and the Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov visited Ashgabat.
Their suspicions grew stronger when on April 3, Bolat Nurgaliev, secretary general of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation, SCO, said “Turkmen integration and engagement in regional processes should be supported”.
Turkmenistan has gone it alone for over a decade, after declaring itself a neutral country in 1995. The late president Saparmurat Niazov cited this neutral status as reason to shun Central Asian regional associations, and he effectively froze Turkmenistan’s participation in the broader CIS, which he termed “an ineffective mechanism for coordination”.
With a new president in office and hope of liberalisation in the air, analysts are predicting a few steps towards regional integration, albeit to a limited extent.
NBCentralAsia sources in Ashgabat say the authorities are serious about integration, and are already weighing up how far they should go in participating in regional cooperation organisations.
“Observers from Turkmenistan will be sent to all meetings of the SCO and the Eurasian Economic Community in the near future,” said the source.
The same source added that while Turkmenistan may embark on economic and humanitarian cooperation very soon, it will not join military alliances or take on major obligations that it might view as impinging on its sovereignty.
NBCentralAsia political expert Mars Sariev says Ashgabat stands to gain by retaining its neutrality and acting as an observer.
“Neutrality together with [Turkmenistan’s] huge energy reserves gives Berdymuhammedov’s regime a political advantage, so it would be short-sighted to tie itself down with obligations arising from membership of unions or alliances,” said Sariev.
Vyacheslav Mamedov, leader of the Civil Democratic Union of Turkmenistan, also thinks it unlikely that Ashgabat will join international groupings, since engaging in bilateral dialogue with individual countries is to its best advantage from an economic point of view.
“The new authorities will put the major emphasis on developing bilateral talks,” said Mamedov.
“Dialogue with Russia, for example, has been the most fruitful in ensuring economic development, while other forms of cooperation schemes are of little interest to Turkmenistan.”
(News Briefing Central Asia draws comment and analysis from a broad range of political observers across the region.)
Political analysts started speculating about a possible rapprochement after President Gurbanguly Berdymuhammedov held talks with his counterparts in the Commonwealth of Independent States, CIS, the Turkmen military participated in a meeting of CIS border guard commanders, and the Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov visited Ashgabat.
Their suspicions grew stronger when on April 3, Bolat Nurgaliev, secretary general of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation, SCO, said “Turkmen integration and engagement in regional processes should be supported”.
Turkmenistan has gone it alone for over a decade, after declaring itself a neutral country in 1995. The late president Saparmurat Niazov cited this neutral status as reason to shun Central Asian regional associations, and he effectively froze Turkmenistan’s participation in the broader CIS, which he termed “an ineffective mechanism for coordination”.
With a new president in office and hope of liberalisation in the air, analysts are predicting a few steps towards regional integration, albeit to a limited extent.
NBCentralAsia sources in Ashgabat say the authorities are serious about integration, and are already weighing up how far they should go in participating in regional cooperation organisations.
“Observers from Turkmenistan will be sent to all meetings of the SCO and the Eurasian Economic Community in the near future,” said the source.
The same source added that while Turkmenistan may embark on economic and humanitarian cooperation very soon, it will not join military alliances or take on major obligations that it might view as impinging on its sovereignty.
NBCentralAsia political expert Mars Sariev says Ashgabat stands to gain by retaining its neutrality and acting as an observer.
“Neutrality together with [Turkmenistan’s] huge energy reserves gives Berdymuhammedov’s regime a political advantage, so it would be short-sighted to tie itself down with obligations arising from membership of unions or alliances,” said Sariev.
Vyacheslav Mamedov, leader of the Civil Democratic Union of Turkmenistan, also thinks it unlikely that Ashgabat will join international groupings, since engaging in bilateral dialogue with individual countries is to its best advantage from an economic point of view.
“The new authorities will put the major emphasis on developing bilateral talks,” said Mamedov.
“Dialogue with Russia, for example, has been the most fruitful in ensuring economic development, while other forms of cooperation schemes are of little interest to Turkmenistan.”
(News Briefing Central Asia draws comment and analysis from a broad range of political observers across the region.)
