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POLITICAL SITUATION IN TURKMENISTAN AND UKRAINIAN-TURKMEN RELATIONS
VITALY KULIK,
Director of the Research Center for Civil Society Problems, Kyiv
Dismissal of Akmurat Rejepov, former head of security service of the Turkmen president, points to the fact that Turkmenistan’s policy has been changed drastically and that new President Kurbanghuly Berdymukhammedov has different approaches to the energy policy than Saparmurat Niyazov did.
Rejepov had been the head of security service of Saparmurat Niyazov for 17 years. It was Rejepov who nominated Berdymukhammedov for the presidency in December 2006. So, his dismissal indicates the important changes in the government hierarchy in Turkmenistan.
This issue is of interest to Kyiv because the gas arrangements between Ukraine and Turkmenistan are the personal agreements between the top managers of the Ukrainian oil and gas sector and the Turkmen authorities. Ukrainian-Turkmen relations in general have been based on personal contacts for 10 years. So, Kyiv must know with whom to deal in Ashgabat and how the current reshuffles will influence the gas dialogue between Ukraine and Turkmenistan.
Reshuffles
Akmurat Rejepov’s dismissal is only one in a row of consequent dismissals. The tendency is obvious. Minister of the Interior of Turkmenistan Akmamed Rakhmanov was the first to be removed. The Turkmen security officials were being dismissed within spring 2007.
Minister of Culture, Television and Radio Enebay Atayeva, Minister of Building and Industry of Building Materials Djumadurdy Kakalyev and some other middle-ranking officials, who had been appointed by Niyazov, were under threat of dismissals. Minister of Energy and Industry of Turkmenistan Yusup Davudov may be relieved of his position too. He was reprimanded officially twice for “weakening of control over the branch supervised” (for the first time he was reprimanded on March 2). He was fired as Deputy Prime Minister after Niyazov had died and now he can be sidelined.
Berdymukhammedov started reforming the governing body of the oil and gas complex. The special body reporting directly to the President, State Agency on Management and Use of Hydrocarbon Resources under the Turkmen President, is being empowered to license the prospecting and production of minerals. It is not clear now who will head the new agency and if this person will come along with Vice Premier Tachberdy Tagyev who is in charge of the oil and gas complex and who is loyal to Ukraine. It is said that the head of the agency may become former Deputy Prime Minister, supervisor of the Fuel and Energy Complex, Yolly Gurmanmuradov, who was released from arrest not long ago.
In any case, the new agency will have to work out its own energy diplomacy. Unlike Niyazov, Berdymukhammedov is not inclined to keep Turkmenistan in ”perfect isolation”. He is going to make a real foreign-policy breakthrough. The question is what will be the directions of the breakthrough?
Energy plans
After Rejepov had been dismissed and Davudov’s positions had been weakened in Ashgabat, a group of pragmatic leaders who intend not only to diversify the energy and political risks, but also to follow active foreign policy that was neglected under Niyazov emerged.
Special stress is laid on intensification of cooperation with Russia. In May Kazakhstan, Russia and Turkmenistan signed the memorandum on construction of a gas pipeline along the eastern coast of the Caspian Sea via which the Turkmen gas will be supplied to Europe through Kazakhstan and Russia. In September 2007, the parties are going to sign the big intergovernmental agreement on redistribution of the Caspian energy transportation routes.
The new Caspian Gas Pipeline with the capacity of 30 billion cubic meters will be constructed in the second half of 2008, and it will go through Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan, Russia, and then it will be connected with the Central Asia - Center pipeline (CAC) or with the Atyrau-Ural branch. Apart from that, the parties came to an agreement about reconstruction of the existing branch of the Caspian gas pipeline (CAC-4) to make its throughput capacity of 10.5 billion cubic meters or more (now it is 4.2 billion cubic meters). The gas pipeline system Central Asia – Center was enlarged towards Uzbekistan (CAC-3).
If this plan is implemented, Ukraine may come tototally depend on Russia’s gas as all the main energy flows from Central Asia will go through Russia. In the same way, the project of construction of the Trans-Caspian Gas Pipeline bypassing Russia (on the Caspian seabed) will be blocked.
But Turkmenistan has not guaranteed yet that the joint (Russian-Turkmen) gas pipeline will be filled. Nobodyknowsexactly how much there are explored and potential gas reserves in Turkmenistan. This is the major state secret that the Turkmen authority is not willing to divulge. That’s why none of the parties involved in the Caspian project speaks about the capacity of the future gas pipeline. Until the issue is clear, the May arrangements will remain the purpose declarations intended for the foreign policy.
Especially as Turkmenistan is not going to withdraw from the Trans-Caspian Gas Pipeline project. Even Berdymukhammedov stated that. “This project is not suspended. The whole world is diversifying the routes of gas supplies”, the Turkmen President said.
Bypassing Russia
Senior researcher of the Heritage Foundation Analytical Center Ariel Koen believes that for oil companies “the Caspian zone is one of the three priority areas after the Gulf and Russia. Essential U.S. interests, such as Central Asia’s independence on Russian, Chinese or radical Islamic supremacy are at stake”.
The EU officials are moving in the same direction. In April and May Kurbanghuly Berdymukhammedov met the representatives of some big European companies, the managers of the American company “Chevron” and the Malaysian company “Petronas” who offered the President a number of large projects.
The Trans-Caspian Gas Pipeline was one of the most long-term Turkmen export projects, in accordance with which Turkmenistan planned to supply 30 billion cubic meters of gas through Azerbaijan to Turkey. But in 1998 the Americans stopped working in this area.
Now the Trans-Caspian Gas Pipeline is on the agenda of the world energy diplomacy again. It was planned that the pipeline would belong to the pipeline system that will go to Turkey, and the Nabucco gas pipeline will go from Turkey to Central Europe.
However, the Trans-Caspian Pipeline costs $5 billion. Until recently the West did too little to implement the project of the Trans-Caspian Gas Pipeline as soon as possible. Moscow took up the initiative. But this does not mean that it is impossible to rival Russia.
In terms of diversification, Ashgabat considers the Iranian and Chinese ways of the gas pipelines to be promising. The previous years Turkmenistan jointly with Iran constructed the gas pipeline and hinted that he is determined to construct the pipeline to Pakistan. In April 2006, when visiting Beijing, Niyazov signed the agreement on supplies of 30 billion cubic meters since 2009. For the present it is not known where the gas pipeline will go. For Beijing the new Turkmen government’s meeting its commitments is of more importance than who will govern Turkmenistan.
Ukrainian interest
Kyiv has always been interested in keeping Ashgabat at arm’s length. It is not only a matter of the special price of the Turkmen gas for Ukraine and the possibility to buy it avoiding the Russian quotas, but ultimately of the participation in implementation of the Thans-Caspian Gas Pipeline project.
So far, Ukraine cannot do all of that. Firstly, Russia and China can buy up all the Turkmen gas for 20 years; secondly if the West and Ukraine do too little or nothing, the Trans-Caspian projects will not be implemented at all. Whatever decisions are made in Krakov about the future of energy alliances “without Russia”, only Ashgabat has the deciding vote.
So, Kyiv should pursue its Caspian policy more subtly. It should not act aggressively or invite any fringe diaspora opposition to the Ukrainian ministerial-level meetings.
Ukraine is an important economic partner for Turkmenistan. The alternative Ukrainian market and transit allow Ashgabat to haggle with Gazprom, while Kyiv, as a political factor, is a connecting link in the dialogue between Turkmenistan and the West. The current Turkmen authorities realize that.
The fact that pragmatists come into power in Ashgabat gives a glimmer of hope that Ukraine's interests will be promoted. If Kyiv does not take advantage of that and if it firmly resolves to deal with neither Turkmenistan nor Russia, we can be withdrawn from the Caspian projects.
June 6, 2007
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