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EURASIANET.ORG: KYRGYZSTAN EVENTS HELPING TO DEFINE CSTO SECURITY ALLIANCE
The early April upheaval in Kyrgyzstan is helping to define what the Collective Security Treaty Organization is, and is not. The Russia-led alliance is definitely not an instrument that can be depended upon by authoritarian-minded leaders in Central Asia to prop up their regimes during times of trouble. The grouping’s central purpose is to shield Russian and Central Asian states from sources of instability in Afghanistan, Russian experts say.
The CSTO consists of Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, Armenia, Belarus and Russia. Seen by many as a counterweight to NATO expansion; CSTO members are not allowed to join other military alliances, and, on paper at least, the allies are committed to the collective defense of any member that comes under outside attack. Less clear was the CSTO’s potential role in instances of destabilizing domestic turmoil: could the organization be used -- as was the Warsaw Pact, the Cold War-era military alliance -- to buttress the status quo against internal forces pushing for change?
The April unrest that unseated Kurmanbek Bakiyev’s administration in Bishkek helped clarify the question of the CSTO’s role in domestic events.
It is now clear that Moscow does not envision the CSTO as playing the role of internal enforcer, said Pavel Felgenhauer, a prominent Moscow-based military analyst. Russia is primarily trying to build up an organization that can protect members from the spread of Islamic radicalism from Afghanistan, Felgenhauer added.
"The possibility seen here [in Moscow] as almost inevitable is that NATO and the United States will lose in Afghanistan and that the Taliban will take over. Then, Russia will form a coalition on the basis of the CSTO to defend Central Asia from an Islamist threat," Felgenhauer told EurasiaNet.org. "They [CSTO forces] are not trained for riot control."
Ajdar Kurtov of the Russian Institute for Strategic Studies (RISS) in Moscow, said the CSTO’s structure is not well suited to react to domestic disturbances. "Although the CSTO calls itself a military organization, it is not. Military organizations usually react to those sorts of events quickly and take measures to save people’s lives. I would say it is more of a political organization, because it reacts when it needs to react and doesn’t really get involved in the events when it doesn’t need to," Kurtov told EurasiaNet.org.
In Kyrgyzstan’s case, the Kremlin was clearly annoyed with Bakiyev, and was not willing to lift a finger in his defense. This example has not been lost on officials in other regional capitals. Concerned that Moscow was even eager to see Bakiyev toppled, some Central Asian leaders have taken care to reaffirm their allegiance to Moscow. Meanwhile, Belarus has seemed to go in the other direction, thumbing its nose at Moscow.
Uzbek President Islam Karimov was among the Central Asian leaders who acted quickly to mend fences with Moscow. During an April 19-20 visit to Moscow, Karimov stressed the importance of Russian-Uzbek security cooperation and expressed concern that events in Kyrgyzstan could destabilize the region.
"Uzbekistan sees in Russia a trusted and tested partner, which has repeatedly proved and showed that Russia is a decisive link in ensuring peace and stability not only in the entire world, but also, above all, in Central Asia," Interfax quoted Karimov as saying. He added that he had come to Moscow to discuss "security and ensuring stability in our troubled Central Asian region."
In the months prior to the Kyrgyz unrest, Tashkent and Moscow had had their differences on the CSTO, and Karimov had seemed determined to keep the organization at arm’s length. He was reportedly angered last summer when Moscow pushed for the CSTO to build a training center for its Collective Rapid Reaction Force (KSOR) in the Kyrgyz portion of the Ferghana Valley.
When he feels threatened, Karimov "always turns to Moscow because he hopes Moscow could help and support him," said Felgenhauer. Karimov is afraid of a Russian hand behind the Kyrgyz unrest, he added.
"There are serious hints that this revolution was supported by Moscow, and though there is no obvious evidence it was engineered in Moscow, there is clear evidence it was supported here. This shows others that if you get into trouble with Moscow, you can be overthrown. So it’s better to cooperate," said Felgenhauer by telephone from Russia’s capital.
After fleeing Kyrgyzstan, Bakiyev eventually wound up in Minsk, the Belarussian capital, where President Alexander Lukashenko, Bakiyev’s host, is threatening to bow out of an upcoming CSTO summit. Lukashenko has voiced dissatisfaction over what he sees as Moscow’s quick support for Bakiyev’s ouster. "What sort of organization is this one [the CSTO], if there is bloodshed in one of our member states and an anti-constitutional coup d’etat takes place, and this body keeps silent?" Lukashenko said, according to news reports.
"Right now the conflict has moved from Bishkek to Minsk and Moscow," said Felgenhauer. "[Russian President Dmitry] Medvedev was outspoken about Lukashenko giving Bakiyev refuge and hinted at the possibility that Moscow could impose sanctions on Belarus. Lukashenko suggested he could impose sanctions on Russian military bases [in Belarus]."
Mirroring Karimov’s posture, Tajik President Imomali Rahmon, nervously eyeing the "internal affair" in Kyrgyzstan, declared on April 24 that he would move closer to Russia’s leaders, with whom he has quarreled recently. "We intend to strengthen and expand our contribution to partnership and cooperation with the CIS, with the Collective Security Treaty Organization member states and ? first of all the Russian Federation which is our strategic partner," Rahmon said in his annual address to parliament.
Rahmon and Karimov are playing it safe, said Felgenhauer.
In Kyrgyzstan, after watching their predecessor succumb so easily, the new leaders of the provisional government in Bishkek have limited options, analysts said.
If anything, the recent events "will just make Kyrgyzstan more isolated," said Alexander Knyazev of the CIS Institute in Bishkek. "I don’t think it will make people rethink how [the CSTO] should work; the organization, first of all, is for solving external conflicts and not internal ones. I think members of the CSTO will just rethink now whether to include Kyrgyzstan as a member."
David TRILLING
“EurasiaNet.org”, April 26, 2010
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