New accords show Central Asia key player in push for new trade routes

The Kazakh government and Russia’s national gas company Gazprom on Wednesday signed an accord on strategic cooperation, Gazprom reported.

A few other transportation accords were signed this week in Tashkent between Central Asian countries and others, including Russia, Afghanistan and Pakistan.  

The deals signal that Central Asia is actively involved in efforts to redraw global trade routes amid the current escalation of geopolitical rivalries.

The accord between Kazakhstan and Gazprom on cooperation in deliveries of natural gas, its transportation and processing was signed in St Petersburg by Gazprom boss Aleksey Miller and Kazakh first deputy prime minister Roman Sklyar.

In October, under a deal signed in June, Gazprom started shipping natural gas to Uzbekistan via Kazakh territory.

The new agreement shows that Gazprom, after losing customers in Europe, is refocusing its long-term plans southwards – Kazakhstan’s location makes it Russia’s main gateway to the rest of Central Asia and southern Asia.

Meanwhile, also on Wednesday, Tashkent hosted a transport forum of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation member countries.

On its sidelines, Russia, Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan signed a memorandum of understanding to create a new trans-Caspian transport route, called South Corridor.

The Uzbek Transport Ministry said the route would give Kyrgyzstan an alternative trade route, reducing its dependence on transit via Kazakhstan.

In the past few years Kyrgyzstan has on several occasions accused Kazakhstan of restricting passage of Kyrgyz lorries through its border, creating long queues. This usually happened at times of political unrest in Kyrgyzstan.

Also at the forum, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan and Russia signed a memorandum of understanding to create a Belarus-Russia-Kazakhstan-Uzbekistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan transport route.

On Thursday Tashkent hosted a meeting of transport ministers of the Organisation of Economic Cooperation. The organisation’s members are Turkey, Pakistan, Azerbaijan, Iran and the Central Asian nations.

The Uzbek Transport ministry said the countries were “looking for solutions” to raise transport cooperation between them to a new level.

At the meeting, Uzbek Transport Minister Ilhom Mahkamov expressed his country’s interest in developing Uzbekistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan and Uzbekistan-Kyrgyzstan-China transport corridors.

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