Is Membership in SCO a Great Triumph for Iran?

By Stasa Salacanin

Global Media Focused

its attention on the September 2022 Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO)’s annual gathering in the ancient city of Samarkand in Uzbekistan. The gathering took place amid an emerging cold war, with heated tensions between the West and the SCO’s two key members: Russia and China.

The formal inclusion of Iran as a permanent member of the organization, scheduled to occur by April 2023, contributed to the perception of an ever-greater divide between the East and the West.

Tehran has long sought to become a member of the SCO and has held the status of observer state since 2005. Last year, finally, the organization accepted Iran’s application to formally join the grouping and on Sept. 15, Tehran signed a memorandum of obligations to join the organization with full membership if all goes according to plan.

The SCO is a Eurasian economic, political and security alliance founded by China, Russia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan in 2001. Since then, it had only expanded once in 2017, accepting India and Pakistan as two new members.

Iran has presented the Samarkand summit as a great diplomatic triumph on the political and economic front, although many analysts remain cautious about Iran’s actual gains and benefits, at least in the short term.

Stasa Salacanin is a widely published author and analyst focusing on the Middle East and Europe. He produces in‐depth analysis of the region’s most pertinent issues for regional and international publications including the Al Jazeera Center for Studies, Middle East Monitor, The New Arab, Gulf News, Al Bawaba, Qantara, Inside Arabia and many more.

IS TEHRAN’S FULL MEMBERSHIP A RESULT OF THE EMERGING COLD WAR?

While Iran’s recent inclusion may now be seen through the lens of the emerging cold war and growing tensions between China, Russia and the West, Dr. Julia Roknifard, assistant professor at the School of Politics, History and International Relations at the University of Nottingham Malaysia, thinks that Russia’s so-called special military operation in Ukraine and the escalation of tensions that ensued was not the entire reason Iran’s membership in the SCO is finally being approved. She recalls that Tehran’s application was made back in 2008 but not given traction until last year.

Until recently, Dr. Roknifard explained, some SCO members, including Russia, preferred to avoid inclusion of a state that is an antagonist to the West, and to the U.S. in particular, in hopes of maintaining or strengthening their own relationships with the West. Moreover, she recalls that there were other obstacles, like Iran’s frictions with some of the regional players, including Uzbekistan, which while it was led by Islam Karimov feared politicizing Islam. But now, she noted, “those obstacles are removed and ambitions by the two leaders within the SCO—China and Russia—to flirt with the West, in order to improve the situation on that front, have been given up.”

This is why the SCO is increasingly seen as an anti-NATO bloc, especially after the outbreak of war in Ukraine when Russia tried to present the regional organizations, especially the SCO, as an anti-Western forum. The inclusion of Iran, as another anti-Western member, is thus not surprising, as many observers believe that it will just amplify the anti-Westernism.

HOW MUCH WILL TEHRAN BENEFIT FROM JOINING THE SCO?

From the Iranian perspective, the quest for membership in the SCO responds perfectly to its policy shift to pivot to the East. Iran is attempting to lower the effects of sanctions by improving relations with its neighbors and pursuing ever-closer strategic ties with Russia and China.

Yet, it is highly uncertain how much Iran will benefit from the membership and, more importantly, whether joining the SCO will significantly improve its economic situation and amortize the effect of the U.S.-imposed sanctions, in case a new nuclear deal is not achieved. Iran’s trade with the SCO member states surpassed US $37 billion in 2021, which accounted for about 30 percent of the country’s total foreign trade.

The nuclear deal, in Roknifard’s opinion, has a very slim chance of being reinstated or renegotiated given all the circumstances. She thinks that since Iran is always looking for new channels to procure what it needs for self-sustenance and to safely export its oil, as well as other items, the SCO membership may offer an effective system to provide for those needs. “You can expect the inclusion of Iran to raise its political profile, providing more credibility for the state when it embarks on dealing with the SCO members and beyond the group,” she told the Washington Report. While Western experts believe that the SCO format is weak, as it is primarily a security and geopolitical organization that lacks any formal economic mechanism to boost trade amongst members, Iran’s membership offers a diplomatic forum for pursuing closer ties to Central Asia and beyond, while Central Asian countries see Iran as a potential transit hub.

Therefore, many observers see the SCO as a platform for expanding bilateral relations but that it simply lacks tools that could effectively respond to Iran’s long-lasting economic hardships. Nevertheless, “inclusion to the SCO strengthens Iran’s image as a responsible and reasonable player and helps promote better communication channels, based on which it is going to advance its economic interests,” Roknifard noted.

Even before becoming a full member of the SCO, Iran already indicated that it strongly desired to pursue stronger relations with China and Russia, the two most powerful SCO members.

Over the past few decades, China and Iran have developed a broad and deep partnership, especially in the field of energy and defense cooperation, as well as geostrategic balancing against the United States. China has become Iran’s most important oil and trading partner. Moreover, last year, the countries signed a 25-year agreement that would include an economic and security partnership paving the road to huge Chinese investments, especially in the country’s infrastructure and energy sector.

Full membership in the SCO will also strengthen Tehran’s ties with Moscow, which have already become exceptionally close, particularly after the events in Ukraine. While their mutual trade turnover increased by 81.7 percent in 2021, reaching $4.035 billion, according to the Russian Federal Customs Service (FCS), their goal is to increase it to $40 billion.

CAN SCO RESOLVE REGIONAL DISPUTES?

There have been many debates regarding whether the SCO can provide a platform for resolving regional differences among the organization’s members and associated partners. Some observers see the inclusion of Iran as step that will increase the image and the value of the SCO as a regional organization. It may even contribute to lowering tensions between some of their members such as Iran and Saudi Arabia (which is also a dialogue partner of the SCO). Others remain reserved about the realistic reach of the SCO in address- ing regional problems, pointing to the case of India and Pakistan, which have not been able to move forward on their longlasting disputes over Kashmir.

Roknifard thinks that a lot of time and effort is needed to build cohesion before the SCO can become a serious platform for negotiations of the sort that are needed between Iran and the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. She thinks that at this point, it would appear more effective for Iran and the Kingdom to resume their negotiations toward rapprochement on a bilateral basis.

In her view, resolving regional issues will depend on further developments within the SCO and its ambitious plan of acquiring new members and dialogue partners. “One can be cautiously optimistic about the SCO providing a platform for a dialogue, but to expect that resolution of many problems would shift from a bilateral to multilateral basis is premature,” according to Roknifard.

Nevertheless, despite objective limitations, Iran’s membership to the world’s largest regional organization, which consists of 40 percent of the world’s population and 30 percent of global gross domestic product (GDP), is certainly a diplomatic triumph for Tehran. Membership will improve its international standing and be a significant step toward pulling out of the U.S.-imposed isolation. It will certainly strengthen its bargaining power with Washington. ■