UNITY OF GOALS AND OBJECTIVES

Amid the weakening international security system and the rapid degradation of previous global and regional platforms of cooperation between different countries, we can witness the significant development of the Turkic cooperation in recent years. This was once again demonstrated at the 10th Summit of the Organisation of Turkic States (OTS) in Astana. Many observers agree that since the Samarkand summit, the Turkic countries have made significant progress in the multilateral agenda.

Particular attention is paid to the growth of mutual trade turnover and the intensification of logistics links between the Turkic states.

Economic engine of Turkic unity

May 2023 saw the official establishment of the Istanbul-based Turkic Investment Fund with a capital of $500m. The fund was first proposed at the 2019 OTS Summit in Baku by Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev and supported by the rest of participants. It will promote intra-regional trade, SMEs, logistics chains, agriculture, green energy, and tourism.

The mutual trade of Turkic countries has been developing quite dynamically even before that— $21b in 2021 compared to $27.5b in 2022, with Türkiye having accounted for more than two-thirds of the total trade volume.

The current dynamics shows that by the end of 2023, the volume of multilateral trade of Turkic countries may exceed $30 billion, which is not the limit. At the same time, the drivers of trade and economic relations are multi-million investment projects. Thus, Türkiye's flagship projects in Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan include the construction of large thermal power plants and enterprises for the processing of raw materials. In turn, the Central Asian states and Azerbaijan are providing assistance to Türkiye to rebuild the regions affected by the catastrophic earthquake in the south-east of the country.

The number of joint projects between the other Turkic states has also increased. Uzbekistan is building a car manufacturing plant in Azerbaijan, while Azerbaijan intends to implement investment plans in Uzbekistan's energy sector. Kazakhstan is building a logistics centre in Uzbekistan to transport goods, while the Uzbek side is building cotton processing plants in southern Kazakhstan. In addition, Azerbaijan is building a five-star hotel next to the Lake Issyk-Kul, Kyrgyzstan.

Political and military aspects

The dynamics of visits indicates that the dialogue within the Turkic group is intensively developing as before.

During the year following the Samarkand summit, President Kasym-Jomart Tokayev (Kazakhstan) visited Türkiye, while President Ilham Aliyev (Azerbaijan) visited Kazakhstan, President Shavkat Mirziyoyev (Uzbekistan) visited Astana and Baku, and Serdar Berdimuhamedov (Turkmenistan) visited Ankara and Tashkent.

Also, there have been contacts between the leaders of the four Turkic Central Asian states and Azerbaijan at a consultative meeting in Dushanbe in September. In addition, all the OTS heads convened at the extraordinary summit in Ankara.

During these official and unofficial meetings, the parties discussed in detail the issues of bilateral and multilateral cooperation, and adopted important decisions, taking the dialogue to a higher level.

Thus, during the visit of the presidents of Azerbaijan to Kazakhstan and of Uzbekistan to Baku, the parties signed agreements on the establishment of the Supreme Interstate Council to ensure the most effective communication between the OTS leaders when making strategic decisions.

The OTS states also enjoy intensive contacts in the defence sector both in terms of military-technical and military cooperation.

In October, joint tactical maritime exercises Khazri-2023 took place in the Azerbaijani sector of the Caspian. Kazakh Defence Minister R. Zhaksylykov visited Baku, where he signed the plan of bilateral military cooperation between the ministries of defence of Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan in 2024. Two weeks later, Azerbaijani Defence Minister Zakir Hasanov visited Uzbekistan, where he discussed the prospects of cooperation in various spheres. This summer, Azerbaijan and Uzbekistan held joint tactical command-staff exercises UZAZ-2023 at the Chirchik training range near Tashkent.

Central Asian states are particularly interested in Azerbaijan's victory in the 44-day war and the experience the Azerbaijani army has gained in recent years. This interest is the basis for cooperation between the Azerbaijani military and their counterparts on the other side of the Caspian.

Apparently, Türkiye is the obvious leader among the OTS states, which intensifies military-technical and military co-operation between the member states. That is because the Turkic states, the former Soviet republics, are trying to adopt the advanced and modern NATO standards for building their own armies. Türkiye is one of the leading NATO countries with a rapidly developing military-industrial complex, with some of its products having been effectively tested in recent years. For example, Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan actively use the latest makes of Turkish UAVs, while Kyrgyzstan is one of the main buyers of Turkish drones in Central Asia.

Turkic states also find Türkiye attractive in terms of the opportunities it provides for military education, combat training and counter-terrorism.

Transport and logistics priorities

Transport is a key area of multilateral cooperation. The Trans-Caspian International Transport Route (TCITR) is the core element of the transport strategy of the Turkic states. At the same time, we can see the active development and significance of parallel communications in Central Asia. Particularly, the China-Kyrgyzstan-Uzbekistan railway project, in which Turkmenistan has also shown interest.

In 2022, cargo traffic via TCITR increased 2.5 times (to 1.5m tonnes) compared to the previous year. During the nine months of 2023, the dynamics of cargo traffic showed an 85.3% growth against the same period of 2022. Thus, by the end of the year we can expect a two-fold increase in cargo volumes. Establishment of joint ventures between railway departments of Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan and Georgia, as well as the measures to simplify cargo clearance procedures show that the existing dynamics will continue in the future. Especially since Azerbaijan, Georgia and Central Asian states are actively upgrading respective road transport infrastructure to increase its throughput capacity.

The same is true for the parallel TCITR route through the territories of Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan. For example, we can see the increase in container traffic between the ports of Turkmenbashi, Turkmenistan and Alat, Azerbaijan. In the past six months, container traffic along the route increased 2.9 times (compared to 2022), and by the end of 2023 we can expect it increase up to 5 or even 6 times.

Cultural co-operation also plays an important role in the cooperation between Turkic states.

Summit of perspectives

Holding the summit in Astana at such a difficult time for the region and the world demonstrates the importance of the role the OTS plays in the foreign policies of member states. It was decided to name the summit Turkic Century to reflect the desire to turn co-operation into a long-term factor of regional politics.

The speeches of the leaders of Turkic countries and the declaration adopted at the end of the meeting traditionally underline the importance of increasing the level of economic cooperation and transport connectivity.

For the first time, the summit provided a broad platform for the environmental agenda, especially the development of green technologies and energy.

The international legitimisation of the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus and the expansion of OTS' ties with other international organisations—ECO and OIC—were discussed separately at the summit.

As to the international agenda, the summit participants noted the need to address the humanitarian problems in Gaza caused by the conflict between Israel and Hamas. Most of the OTS states maintain good relations with Israel. Therefore, they used very restrained language when assessing the current situation in Palestine.

Remarkably, the final victory of Azerbaijan over Armenian separatism received a peculiar political assessment during the summit. The heads of state and government of the participating countries unanimously praised the results of local anti-terrorist operations in the Garabagh  Economic Region and agreed to hold an extraordinary informal summit of the OTS in Shusha. This will be an official and final confirmation of the results of the long-term struggle of the Azerbaijani people against Armenian separatism by all states of the organisation, a symbolic and political statement of the thesis that Garabagh is Azerbaijan.