Russia and China in Central Asia

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Despite predictions of conflict between Russian and Chinese interests in Central Asia, Moscow and Beijing continue to collaborate on common goals. These include limiting US and Western influence, ensuring regional stability, and securing economic gains, The Caspian Post reports citing foreign media.

Fissures between Moscow and Beijing exist, especially in the economic sphere, where China has become the more dominant power, and over the potential development of the Middle Corridor trade route, which could significantly disadvantage Russia. However, Russia and China are managing these divergences, and the overarching imperative to weaken the United States provides a powerful motive for reducing or preventing any friction from derailing their broader partnership.

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has heightened the Central Asian states’ apprehensions about Russia, including about its capacity to uphold its security role in the region. However, the Kremlin remains committed to maintaining its influence in the region, and the war in Ukraine is restructuring economic dynamics in ways that will enable the Kremlin to limit the extent of its declining economic influence.

Looking forward, the most significant change in Russia-China relations in Central Asia is likely to occur in the security sphere, where China is likely to take on a greater role, especially as Russia’s military and security services are preoccupied in Ukraine and with the domestic challenges the war creates. Any rise in instability in the region—which could result from an uptick in terrorist threats in the aftermath of the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan, or from the region’s brittle autocracies—could propel China to step into a sphere where Russia has historically played the primary role but that the Kremlin will struggle to fulfill while the war in Ukraine continues.

For Russia and China, Central Asia is also likely to be an important building block in their larger counterorder-building effort. The two countries are likely to sustain—and step up—their efforts to build an alternative order in Central Asia, including by deepening cooperation and broadening the number of countries participating in the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) to legitimize and demonstrate the benefits of their collective global leadership. This effort will face resistance from the Central Asian states that object to the concept of a Russia-China condominium of power in their region and have shown an ability to come together to resist attempts to turn the SCO into a forum that would strengthen a collective Russia-China security role in the region.

The United States has an opportunity to redouble its engagement in Central Asia. The Central Asian states highly value U.S. political support for their independence and sovereignty, especially following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Washington can encourage greater connectivity and cohesion among the countries, demonstrating its support for their increasing cooperation with one another in ways that could strengthen the region’s economic attractiveness and political agency. This contrasts with the way in which Russia has traditionally dealt with the region, which is to try to capitalize on divisions and disputes among the countries.

While it cannot match China dollar for dollar or supplant Russia’s cultural and political influence in the region, the United States can enhance its trade, investment, energy, counterterrorism, and diplomatic ties to these countries. Enhancing U.S. and European investment in Central Asia, especially for development of the Middle Corridor, could help prevent Russia and China from further deepening their grip on the region.

Introduction

Since the announcement of the Russia-China “no limits” partnership in February 2022 and Russian President Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine just days later, observers have sought to assess how the two countries’ relations will evolve, including in Central Asia—a region long thought to be a potential source of friction. Several experts have pointed to competition over energy resources, transit routes, trade, political influence, and security relationships as factors that will hinder their ability to share power or form a kind of joint condominium over the region. So far, those expectations have not been borne out, as their overarching geopolitical imperative to undermine the United States and the order it leads has provided powerful motivation to prevent any sources of friction from derailing their broader agenda. If anything, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has catalyzed deeper cooperation between the two—a trend that is likely to carry over into their relations in Central Asia.

The landlocked former Soviet republics of Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, and Turkmenistan—bound by the Caspian Sea to the west, Iran and Afghanistan to the south, China to the east, and Russia to the north—are seeking to rebalance their foreign policies following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and to reach out to nations other than China and Russia to bolster their economic and security options. The Central Asian nations still look to the United States and Europe, as well as the Gulf states and East Asian partners, to support their independence, sovereignty, and territorial integrity—issues that have taken on new importance following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. But they also appreciate that Russia and China do not press them on democracy and human rights issues. Given these competing interests, Central Asian nations—with Kazakhstan in the lead—will continue to pursue engagement with multiple nations and keep their options open to avoid overdependence on any one country or bloc of nations.

This paper argues that while the Central Asian states will seek to balance against the growing cooperation and combined influence of Russia and China in their region, Moscow and Beijing are likely to sustain cooperation in service of their shared objectives. These include keeping the United States and Europe out of the region and advancing their shared notions of indivisible security—or the idea that one state’s safety should not come at the expense of another’s—and the centrality of state-determined political rights. For Russia and China, Central Asia is likely to be an important building block in their larger effort to create an alternative global order. Central Asia provides them with a region to legitimize and demonstrate the benefits of their collective global leadership. The war in Ukraine, however, is altering their current arrangement, in which China is the dominant economic power while Russia is the primary external security provider. The longer the war in Ukraine continues, the more likely it becomes that China will continue its gradual trajectory of assuming a larger security presence in the region—a reality that Moscow is likely to tolerate while its military is degraded, and China’s actions remain consistent with their shared objectives.

The first section of this paper identifies key changes in the region since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine that create the context for assessing the future trajectory of Russia-China relations in Central Asia. The second section identifies the drivers that are likely to shape the future of their relationship in the region. The third section provides an assessment of where Russia-China relations are most likely to head in the region over the next three to five years. Finally, it examines the implications for the United States and its allies.