The Summit of the Turkic countries is an event of huge geopolitical significance, even though it is obvious that Baku, Astana and Ankara have different motivations for participating in projects aiming at the founding of a union of Turkic countries. Ankara is more interested in widening its influence in the South Caucasus and Central Asia. Moreover Turkey has interests linked not only to social and cultural, humanitarian and educational cooperation programmes in the terms of TÜRKSOY, but also becoming an independent player like Beijing, Brussels, Moscow and Washington in the region of Central Asia. Of course Turkey had much better chances at the beginning of the 1990s after the collapse of the Soviet Union. But now it is obvious that the idea of joining the EU is put off for some time which means that Turkey is forming another direction of its geopolitical interests. In my opinion, Astana plays its game together with Ankara. Another thing is that the interests of Nursultan Nazarbayev and the Kazakh elite lie in the image part of the project. There is no secret that Astana is developing a few integration projects - the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, the Eurasian Economic Community and others. The integrating movement of the Turkic world fits the image idea of Nursultan Nazarbayev as the main Eurasian integrator. Moreover the idea of practical “Eurasianness” is a Kazakh idea proposed 16 years ago. And finally Azerbaijan which is more interested in the bilateral dialogue than Baku-Ankara or Baku-Astana. But in general Ilham Aliyev is not against developing the Turkic projects in the sphere of economics, energy or TURKSOY activities. So each country has its own interest, and the unclear future of the project could be possibly explained by the fact that all countries want their own bonuses in the end.As for Tashkent, the answer is known in advance, Islam Karimov is not madly keen to participate in any integrating structures. Neither with Russia, nor with the West or any representatives of the Turkic world, in this case Kazakhstan and Turkey.
The reason is twofold. The first is that Karimov prefers bilateral contacts. The second is that there is no understanding with the other leaders ruling the countries after collapse of the Soviet Union. I mean Nursultan Nazarbayev. Tashkent prefers to develop economic, educational or humanitarian programmes which are useful for the Uzbek president. The change of attitude to the idea of Turkic unity might happen after the change of the power in Uzbekistan. But at the moment to talk about any participation of Uzbekistan in the SCO, EEC or Turkic integration is absolutely naïve.
To be continued.
Alexei Vlasov. Exclusively for VK.
