This Friday, June 30, Sergei Lavrov announced that Iran would join the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) next week. “At the next meeting of the Committee of Heads of State, which will be held on July 4, Iran’s full membership will be formalized,” the Russian Foreign Minister assured the press. Iran, a simple observer of the organization since 2005, had obtained its membership at an SCO summit in 2021. But what are the objectives of this organization?
Set up in June 2001 by Moscow and Beijing to succeed the “Shanghai group” founded in 1996, this regional alliance currently includes eight countries: Russia, China, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan , India and Pakistan. The SCO is the largest of the regional organizations, both in terms of its geographical scope (because it represents 26% of land mass), by its demographic weight (42% of the world population), and its economic weight (22% or a fifth of world GDP).
Coalition against the West
This intergovernmental organization, without western members, positions itself as an alternative to other world organizations where the influence of the United States and the European Union is significant. This is also the case of the BRICS, which bring together Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa at annual summits since 2011, and which Tehran also wishes to integrate. Although it does not pool its military forces like NATO, the SCO has three nuclear powers: India, China and Russia. And soon Iran, which is on the threshold.
In recent months, Tehran has been trying to reduce its international isolation by getting closer to China and Russia. A mission carried out by various means: by calming tensions with Western countries, but also by reconciling with its Arab neighbors such as Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and Egypt.
Make Eurasia the center of the world
To free itself from Western hegemony, the stated aim of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization is to shift the economic, political and military center of gravity towards the Eurasian zone, in order to develop a parallel globalization there.
One of its most crucial roles remains “the preservation of regional security and stability”, insisted its secretary general, the Chinese Zhang Ming, during the last SCO summit in September 2022. The alliance aims so to stabilize the Central Asian region, as in Afghanistan, by fighting against fundamentalist and separatist movements.
From security cooperation, Member States’ collaboration has also extended to other areas, such as energy, the digital economy and transport, according to the chinese media. The alliance also wants to establish its banking exchange system, which would be the counterpoint to Swift, notes TV5 World.
The OCS is thus developing several pharaonic projects, including that of a railway line that would link China and Central Asia to Europe by bypassing Russia – via Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan, reports The Economisyou. It also plans to open up Afghanistan by connecting it to the sea, thanks to 573 kilometers of rails.
In exchange for its entry into the organization, Iran now offers the SCO an anchorage in the Middle East, hitherto the prerogative of the United States. Tehran will therefore have more facilities for exporting its oil and gas, and importing technologies rejected by Western countries.