The 18th Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) summit took place in Qingdao in China’s Shandong Province on June 9 and June 10.
It was the organization’s first summit after its expansion and China’s second major diplomatic event this year, following the annual Boao Forum for Asia in April.
India’s and Pakistan’s entry to the SCO last year is a sign that the organization has moved its core region from Central Asia to South Asia to become the regional security organization that covers the largest population — more than 3.1 billion, or 44 percent of the global population — while the value of the combined GDP of the nations is US$15 trillion, 24 percent of global GDP.
Taiwan should pay close attention to the effects of this China-initiated international organization on its New Southbound Policy.
The twists and turns in the SCO’s development reflect global strategic and economic changes, as well as changes in the global power of the US, Russia and China.
The organization has enabled Russia to maintain its legacy in Central Asia, while continuing to exert its influence and protect its interests there and in South Asia.
Central Asia is China’s “backyard,” and the region’s stability is closely related to that of China’s economy and energy supply, in addition to Beijing’s issues with separatism.
If Beijing can use the SCO’s development to consolidate its influence in the region, it will be able to pay more attention to East and South Asia. The organization would influence the stability and development of the Asia-Pacific region, thus profoundly affecting Taiwan’s geostrategic security.
For Russia and China, two founding nations, the organization is just a mediating tool to maintain their influence, and to make strategic and energy gains in Central Asia.
Faced with the threat of US intervention in their backyard, the powers are joining hands to promote and reinforce the organization together. When it comes to absolute interests, each is taking what it needs while benefiting from the other.
However, when it comes to relative interests, it seems they are also competing with each other, which is likely to be exposed once China’s “Silk Road Economic Belt” overlaps with the Russia-led Eurasian Economic Union. In particular, India and Pakistan would inevitably bring their division into the group.
As a result of China’s Belt and Road Initiative, a grand strategy for its national development, the focus of the SCO summit changed from anti-terrorism to emphasizing security and economics.
As China introduced its initiative to the SCO platform and is moving toward South Asia, close attention should be given to the move, as it has a high degree of overlap with the New Southbound Policy.
On the first day of the SCO summit, Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) arranged a sideline meeting with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi to discuss the execution of resolutions that the two discussed during their informal meeting in Wuhan, China, in late April.
Modi also had an unofficial meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Sochi on May 21, showing that India is becoming a “balancer” between China and Russia following its SCO entry.
From a broader perspective, when Modi took part in the 17th Asia Security Summit, better known as the Shangri-La Dialogue, in Singapore on June 1, India, the US, Japan and Australia reiterated in their multilateral meeting that openness, freedom, prosperity and inclusiveness lie at the heart of the Indo-Pacific region and promoted it as a region based on law.
However, he also said that the region is a geographic, not a strategic, concept and that India’s vision for the region is “positive.”
“By no means do we consider it as directed against any country,” Modi said, adding that New Delhi is willing to take an inclusive approach and maintain contacts with all nations in the region.
This highlights the complexity of the relationship between the US, China, Russia and India, and the opposition between and weaknesses of the SCO and the Indo-Pacific Strategy, as well as the fact that in international politics, a nation’s priority is its own interests.
At a time when the government is pushing its New Southbound Policy, it should keep a close eye on the SCO’s extension of its influence over regional security and economies in South Asia.
Kuo Wu-ping is a professor at Nanhua University’s Institute of European Studies.
Translated by Eddy Chang
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