Subtleties of multi-vector policy of President Berdymukhamedov

The President of Turkmenistan at the end of last week paid a blitz visit to Beijing. Regional and international issues of mutual interest were discussed in talks with President Xi Jinping. Experts believe that this meeting took place due to the need to make adjustments to Sino-Turkmen relations after the visit to Ashgabat of Japanese Prime Minister Abe Sinzdo and US Secretary of State John Kerry. Clearly, Beijing would like to receive assurances from Berdimuhamedov of a strengthening bond between Ashgabat and Beijing or even the priority of Turkmenistan's relations with China to the United States and Japan.

Xi Jinping at the meeting with Gurbanguly Berydmuhamedov said that China is willing to enhance cooperation with Turkmenistan in the energy industry, as well as in areas such as humanitarian communication and safety. "Through sides should deepen cooperation in security against the backdrop of the difficult and serious situation in the region, together against the ‘three evil forces’ and transnational organized crime", the news agency ‘Xinhua’ quotes the Chinese leader. The Turkmen President, in turn, invited Xi Jinping in Ashgabat to celebrate the 20th anniversary of Turkmenistan's neutrality, which will be held in December.

Ashgabat, commenting on the visit of the leader of Beijing, was limited by the news that ‘Chinese companies intend to strengthen their positions in the promising Turkmen market and actively develop economic and trade relations.’

The government publication ‘Neutral Turkmenistan’ recalls that representatives of Chinese businesses are taking an active part in the ongoing large-scale investment projects, including the construction of important objects of industrial and social facilities, in particular in the framework of the integrated development of the largest gas field in Turkmenistan -‘Galkinish’. According to the bilateral agreements, increasing the volume of gas supplies to China should be done at the expense of deposits. The previous success in the construction of the three main Chinese pipelines was due to the decision of Turkmenistan to provide Chinese companies with unprecedented access to the Galkinish mine. Now new gas productions at the field are assumed to TAPI (Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India), the construction of which was recently announced by Berdimuhamedov. The ceremony of laying the TAPI gas pipeline is scheduled for December 13th 2015. Another part of the Galkynysh field will be explored by Japan.

During the visit of Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe to Ashgabat on October 23rd bilateral agreements on projects worth over 18 billion dollars were signed. This, according to experts, dramatically changes the entire character of Turkmen-Chinese gas cooperation and the geopolitics of the whole of Turkmenistan. "Among other things, the decision to build the TAPI and US guarantees of security for the pipeline that are not certain for the moment, and Turkmenistan itself only confirms speculation that the military activities of Taliban groups on the Turkmen border during 2014-2015 was organized to put pressure on the government of Turkmenistan and to reduce gas supplies to China and complete military reorientation of Turkmenistan for the US,’’ an expert on Central Asia and the Middle East Alexander Knyazev told Vestnik Kavkaza

A Senior Researcher of the Institute of Oriental Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Doctor of History Shohrat Kadyrov, said that ‘the sudden visit of President Berdimuhamedov to China is connected with the last visits of the Prime Minister of Japan and US secretary of state to Turkmenistan." "Beijing is worried about the visits of the Japanese prime minister and US secretary of state to Ashgabat, and it is reasonable to assume that China wanted clarification in order to have a clear idea of where everything is going. Just two weeks ago Japan signed with Turkmenistan an unprecedented agreement with a package of economic agreements for more than 18 billion dollars." The talk about TAPI has been conducted from the time of Turkmenbashi, and the gas for the pipeline is present only in ‘Galkinish’. Therefore, everything that is happening there is not surprising. Figuratively speaking, China is a great reality receding into the past, and Japan is just a beginning to Turkmenistan's future, with high technology for thermal power plants, without which the high-tech industrial complexes are not able to work according to international standards raised in Japan with the help of Turkey and South Korea, including a unique plant for production of gasoline from natural gas. China is not able to surpass Japan and its allies in this kind of assistance to Turkmenistan. Japan also has a situational interest -stuffing of a yen that is cheap compared to the dollar in the economy of Turkmenistan, it is a timely step, which allows to transform not only their money, but also to put the natural gas of Turkmenistan to the products of high demand in the global market," Kadyrov said

The Director of the Analytical Center of IMI MGIMO, Andrei Kazantsev. said that Berdimuhamedov has started bargaining: "Russia and other countries of the world tend to underestimate the delicacy of the ongoing Central Asian multi-vector policy. Its essence lies in the fact that contacts with one partner are usually used to increase the interest in the relevant country by another partner. Something like an Oriental bazaar. Any eastern person has an intuitive understanding of how to do this. For example, help or even just suggestions from the US are used to obtain alternative assistance from Russia, contacts with the US and Russia used in China and so on." In this context, according to Kazantsev, Berdimuhamedov's visit to Beijing is part of the normal multi-vector policy strategy. 

Ashgabat tries to use the previous active contacts with Tokyo and Washington as an argument in cooperation with Beijing, or quite simply to strengthen their bargaining position.

The expert noted that there is another aspect of Berdimuhamedov's visit to Beijing. A few steps of Turkmenistan were interpreted as directed against the informal bloc of Moscow and Beijing, and in turn, friendly to Washington and Tokyo. These steps include the visit of Minister of Foreign Affairs of Turkmenistan in the United States amid speculation of the possible transfer of the American airbases to Mary-2. The statement by Ashgabat about the construction of the TAPI (which inevitably needs security guarantees from the United States as the only country with a significant military presence in Afghanistan) can be interpreted as the same thing. Finally, enhanced cooperation with Japan in the oil and gas industry is inevitably interpreted as aimed at finding alternatives to Chinese influence in the Turkmen economy. A bunch of ‘US -Japan’ could replace a bunch of ‘China-Russia’. ‘But the US is not ready to give Ashgabat any serious security guarantees, both due to human rights concerns (the situation in this sphere does not correspond to the image of the Obama administration), and due to the general line of the Americans on the gradual withdrawal of troops from Afghanistan. Ashgabat realized this after Kerry's visit, which promised nothing serious, and attention focused on the protection of human rights.

Thereafter, Turkmenistan turned back to its basic economic partner currently - China. True, the question of what to do with the growing threats to security on the Afghan border remains open, as security guarantees from the United States have not been received, and China is not ready to give guarantees of security due to the peculiarities of its strategy. Therefore Ashgabat will probably have to turn back to Moscow to solve this problem at some time," Andrey Kazantsev told Vestnik Kavkaza.