The past week for Russian diplomacy was entirely devoted to Afghanistan.
Having taken off on Tuesday, July 13, to Dushanbe, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov immediately left for Tashkent.
An important event was held in Tashkent under the Chinese-Russian flags of the SCO (Shanghai Cooperation Organization).
In Uzbekistan - rather, under the American and British.
Russia was there and there.
In addition, on the sidelines of the SCO in Dushanbe or at an Uzbek international conference, the head of the Russian Foreign Ministry is promoting the "Moscow line" and the Russian peacekeeping initiative of the "expanded three" format (the United States, China, Pakistan +, of course, Russia itself).
In order to expand the composition of the participants - and Russian influence on the negotiation process in Afghanistan - Sergei Lavrov in Tashkent announced that the composition of the Moscow format could expand and other externally influential players would join it (according to media reports, we are probably talking about Iran and India ).
But we will return to Central Asia, where a group of "heavyweights" of Russian diplomacy has been working all last week.
So, on July 14, the President of Tajikistan Rahmon met with the foreign ministers of the member countries of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization.
The most important topic, apart from scheduled discussions, is, of course, Afghanistan.
The summit of foreign ministers was attended, among others, by Afghan Foreign Minister Mohammad Hanif Atmar.
Let me remind you that the SCO was created in 2001 on the basis of the Shanghai Five: China, Russia, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan.
In recent years, with the growing ambitions of China and Russia, the SCO has grown stronger and is challenging other centers of power in international politics.
Since I have written more than once about the possible geopolitical triangle "China - Russia - Iran", which is the Western "nightmare", I will clarify that until now Iran does not have membership in the SCO (no matter how strange it may seem).
Today the SCO has eight member states: Uzbekistan, India and Pakistan have been added to the "Shanghai Five".
States with observer status: Iran, Afghanistan, Mongolia and Belarus.
The Russian delegation in Dushanbe called for Iran to finally be granted membership in the SCO.
Since 2021, the chairmanship of the Shanghai Organization is transferred from Russia to Tajikistan, and the congress of foreign ministers was a rehearsal for the 20th anniversary summit on September 16-17 in Dushanbe.
Coincidence or not, but right now Tajikistan is entering the top of news related to the deterioration of the situation in Afghanistan.
Last week, as I already wrote, about 1,000 Afghan servicemen crossed the Tajik border, fleeing the Taliban offensive *.
Therefore, in the Afghan crisis, Tajikistan is now really at the forefront of all the SCO member states.
Rakhmon was next to President Putin at the last Victory Parade held in Moscow, and in Tajikistan itself there is the 201st Russian military base numbering about 7 thousand people, where recently, in connection with the development of events in Afghanistan, the combat readiness of the S-300 was checked.
Having mobilized 20 thousand troops to strengthen the protection of the border with Afghanistan, yesterday, July 16, President Rahmon checked the combat readiness of the troops - he visited the border detachments of the Panj and Mir Sayyid Ali Hamadoni districts in the Khatlon region and held a military parade.
In general, in Central Asia, Tajikistan is Moscow's “support heel”.
And if you want peace, prepare for war.
Immediately after Dushanbe, the Russian delegation flew to Tashkent.
There, under the chairmanship of President Shavkat Mirziyoyev, on July 15-16, a top-level international conference “Central and South Asia: Regional Connectivity.
Challenges and Opportunities ”.
Uzbekistan, some experts joke, spends budgets comparable to the military on PR - in this sensitivity to the country's international PR in the West, today's Uzbekistan is similar to Anglophile Azerbaijan.
Also on russian.rt.com "Why are you running away, leaving those who worked with you in danger?": Translator - about the withdrawal of the US and NATO from Afghanistan
So, real stars have gathered in Tashkent - Joe Biden's Homeland Security Advisor Elizabeth Sherwood-Randall, US Special Representative for Afghanistan Zalmay Khalilzad, EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs Josep Borrell, Foreign Ministers of more than 20 countries, and - most notably - to the conference Afghan President Ashraf Ghani and Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan arrived.
What has already promised to be hot: it is known that the official Kabul considers Pakistan the birthplace of the Taliban and their main beneficiary.
The official application of the conference is the prospects for modernizing the economies of Central and South Asia, including the expansion of existing transport corridors and the construction of new ones.
Afghanistan is unique in this sense: it is he who is the bridge from Central Asia to South.
Therefore, without it, the construction of a new future in the mentioned region is impossible.
Pakistani Interior Minister Sheikh Ahmed Rashid said last week the importance of peace in Afghanistan and who controls the main lever of this peace (or war) - though not on the sidelines of the Tashkent conference, but during his election campaign in a controlled Pakistan Kashmir:
“Dialogue with the Taliban is in the interests of all.
We will keep the peace in neighboring Afghanistan.
Not only for Pakistan - it is important for the whole world to start negotiations with the Taliban *.
If, for example, China wants to invest $ 400 billion in Iran, this is impossible without peace in Afghanistan.
The train we want to run to Uzbekistan is impossible without stability in Afghanistan.
China, Russia, Iran, Pakistan are in a changed region.
Pakistan's strategic position ensures that no superpower can afford to ignore it. ”
Pakistan is a former British colony, today not only the sixth largest army in the world, but also the owner of nuclear weapons.
It is really difficult for neighbors not to reckon with him, especially when they force the Taliban into the country and explain that nothing will come of it without them.
On Friday, Amrullah Saleh, Vice President of Afghanistan, one of the zealous fighters against the Taliban, recalled that for many years Islamabad denied the existence of the Quetta Shura, just as today it denies its involvement in the massacre in Afghanistan (in Quetta, as well as in Peshawar, - the headquarters of the Taliban, where, among other things, they received funding and rewards for terrorist attacks or attacks, according to Saleh).
Quetta is the capital of Pakistani Baluchistan, a place of high Chinese activity and the port of Gwadar, which should (but has not yet become) one of the pearls of the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC).
And in the very days when in Tashkent, President Ashraf Ghani accused Pakistan of supporting the Taliban (according to him, over the past month, the ranks of the Taliban were joined by 10,000 new fighters from Pakistan and neighboring countries), and Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan objected to him - they say that his country suffers because of what is happening almost more than others (3 million refugees, 70 thousand injured in the last 15 years alone) - a real Afghan-Pakistani blockbuster has unfolded in Afghanistan itself.
On Thursday, the first day of the Tashkent conference, Pakistan agreed with the Taliban on a three-hour opening of the Spin-Boldak checkpoint in Kandahar (the Taliban took control of it).
Formally - for the return of Pakistanis and Afghans to their countries.
Informally, who knows who the Taliban from Pakistan let in under the guise of "returning home refugees".
According to Amrullah Saleh, the vice president of Afghanistan, Pakistan on Thursday threatened Afghan pilots by radio communications, demanding that they not approach the border in the Spin Boldak area closer than 18 km.
At this time, footage shot by the Taliban from Spin-Boldak, Kandahar, appeared on the social network: having captured the settlement, the Taliban boasted of trophies - captured by army armored vehicles Humvee.
That is, under the air cover of Pakistan, the Taliban seized and butchered Afghan settlements.
Yesterday, the Afghan army seemed to have recaptured Spin Boldak, but the conference in Islamabad dedicated to a "peaceful Afghan settlement", scheduled for July 17, was postponed to July 25. But it is not known whether it will happen, since today, on Saturday, it became known that the daughter of the Afghan Ambassador to Pakistan Najibullah Alikhil, who is now in a hospital (Sputnik Afghanistan), was abducted and tortured in Islamabad.
Despite the fact that in Tashkent, President Ashraf Ghani drew quite optimistic prospects for himself: the opening of the Trans-Afghan railway Termez - Mazar-i-Sharif - Kabul - Peshawar, linking South Asia with Europe and falling under the One Belt - One Road project, serious American assets, abandoned by the Americans (including the Bagram airfield, which, like other military airfields, can be built into trade and logistics hubs), the construction of new mining facilities - there is also a pessimistic scenario.
Ashraf Ghani's government is covered from the air by US Central Command (from Miami) under General Frank Mackenzie until 31 August.
It is not entirely clear what will happen next, who will support official Kabul.
But something else is known: the head of the Russian Foreign Ministry announced the initiative of the Americans in the near future to take out of Afghanistan about 100 thousand Afghans who collaborated with them to a safe place.
Moreover, initially it was about the Central Asian states placing these 100 thousand people at home (and making their territory a target of the Taliban, we add from ourselves. A clever plan to destabilize the region with minimal efforts. -
Yu
.
Yu
.).
As a result, NBC News announced today that the United States is evacuating 2.5 thousand people directly to its territory, and not to third countries, as previously planned.
Another 115 Afghans who helped the Canadian military pulled out their lucky ticket and are awaiting evacuation to Canada.
Also on russian.rt.com Controlled migration: what is behind the US promises to evacuate Afghans loyal to them
The question remains: where are the remaining 97.5 thousand people evacuated?
Or will they simply be disposed of, leaving them in Afghanistan to wait for the Taliban?
This question is one of the most important for the image of the United States, because the reprisal against American allies left to fend for themselves in front of the advancing "terrorist organization banned in Russia" will show the whole world whether it is worth trusting Washington in the future, whether it is a reliable partner.
The results of the two Central Asian summits: regular talks between the Taliban and the Afghan government will start in Doha today;
China has offered a new platform for negotiations in Beijing;
from all the international platforms of the "Afghan dialogue" a new four have spun off, which wants to create the world on their own, without other countries - the United States, Afghanistan, Pakistan and Uzbekistan.
The withdrawal of the Americans from Afghanistan gave rise to an interesting phenomenon - the competition of world powers for the status of peacekeepers.
This Afghanistan is too tasty.
And too complicated.
"Afghanistan does not need new formats, the main thing is the implementation of the agreements already reached," commented Sergey Lavrov on the results of his "Asian" week.
"It is obvious that the US mission has failed, and the neighboring states - Pakistan and the allies of the Russian Federation in Central Asia, including Uzbekistan, are not ready to host American military bases."
The fact that there will be no American bases in Afghanistan is not yet a reason to relax, since the strategy of destabilizing the region may be subtler and more sophisticated than a direct military presence.
Perhaps that is why yesterday in Tashkent, Russian Foreign Minister Lavrov and Russian President's Special Representative for Afghanistan Zamir Kabulov went to closed talks with Afghan President Ashraf Ghani.
The threat from the north for Russia and the CSTO members has not been canceled.
The point of view of the author may not coincide with the position of the editorial board.
* "Taliban" - the organization was recognized as terrorist by the decision of the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation of February 14, 2003.