Qishloq Ovozi (Archive)

Did a door to Europe just open up for Central Asia?

The five Central Asian states have been independent for nearly 25 years and throughout that time -- as talk continued about recreating the ancient Silk Road -- there was always one direction that was off limits: the route through Iran.

But, judging by the encouraging news from negotiations between Tehran and world powers, that route might soon open and, if it does, it will have a dramatic effect on Central Asia.

RFE/RL's Turkmen Service, known locally as Azatlyk, assembled a roundtable discussion to discuss the new opportunities for Central Asia if and when international sanctions on Iran started to be lifted.

Azatlyk director Muhammad Tahir moderated a panel that included Mohammad Boghrati of RFE/RL's Radio Farda, Alex Vatanka of the Washington-based Middle East Institute, and Hussein Aryan, a London-based independent Iranian analyst. As usual, I also chimed in with some comments.

In terms of trade, Central Asia is ideally located geographically in the heart of the Eurasian continent, but geopolitically the region has been boxed in.

The southern trade route through Afghanistan has been practically impossible due to instability and Iran was effectively off limits. The Caspian Sea to the west offers little trade potential at the moment, due in large part to its unclear legal status.

As Vatanka noted, this meant that the only routes open to Central Asia up to now have been "to the north, the giant Russia, and to the east another giant, China."

The Central Asians have wanted "to break that geopolitical grip [of China and Russia]," but with the southern route closed off there were no other options. Now, Vatanka said, "You see from Astana to Ashgabat an interest in reconsidering what Iran can do for them geopolitically to lessen their reliance on countries like Russia and China."

A trade route through Iran, westward toward Europe or south to the Persian Gulf States, changes the dynamics of trade for Central Asia and would also give the five countries a bit more leverage at the bargaining table with their "giant" neighbors.

And the most dramatic change in trade is likely to be in energy politics.

"One particular area where Iran would be interested in having sanctions lifted would be in the domain of energy where Iran would be able to absorb foreign investment," Aryan explained. "That would give Iran a real boost in terms of its economy."

Iran not only has huge oil and gas reserves, it also offers the shortest non-Russian route for shipping Central Asian gas and oil to Europe. President Hassan Rohani mentioned this fact during his visit to Turkmenistan last month and the National Iranian Gas Company (NIGC) publicly offered at the start of February to transfer Azerbaijani and Turkmen gas to Europe through Turkey.

The European Union has been anxious to diversify its gas suppliers so it can decrease its dependence on Russian gas. The EU Southern Gas Corridor projects include receiving supplies of Azerbaijani and Turkmen gas, and possibly also gas from Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan, via this route.

The EU has been speaking with Azerbaijan and Turkmenistan for months about finally building a Trans-Caspian pipeline (TCP) to bring Turkmen gas across the Caspian Sea to Azerbaijan and on to Europe. The EU's chief negotiator for the Southern Gas Corridor, Maros Sefcovic, is due to go to Turkmenistan in the coming weeks to discuss the construction of the TCP.

Iran would be an easier and cheaper route and the construction of the Trans-Anatolian Pipeline (TANAP) stretching across Turkey just started in mid-March. TANAP will eventually have the capacity to ship some 60 billion cubic meters of gas per year and will ultimately need more than Azerbaijani gas to fill it.

However, some of the panelists mentioned that it would be a minimum of five years and probably closer to a decade before any energy export projects through Iran were operational.

Other Issues

There were other concerns mentioned, such as the Turkish-Iranian rivalry in the region, which could one day threaten these southern routes to Europe.

However, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan was due to visit Iran on April 7, and the transportation of gas was reportedly high on his agenda.

One of the other factors to be considered is Russia's reaction to Iran not only entering the gas market, but acting as a transit country for gas from the Caspian Basin region. Russia is the obvious loser in such a scenario, as Iran, Azerbaijan, and Central Asian countries would be replacing Russian gas to Europe with their own gas, which is precisely the thinking that lies behind the Southern Gas Corridor project.

Another issue was the influence Iran might have on Central Asia if sanctions were lifted. Vatanka and Aryan agreed that the days when Iran might have dreamed of exporting its Islamic Revolution into Central Asia are long gone. There never was much hope for majority Shi'ite Iran to lure majority Sunni Central Asia into Tehran's sphere of influence, but there were such concerns and some Iranian movement in that direction in the early 1990s, right after the Central Asian states became independent.

Vatanka pointed out that Iran seems to have respected Russia's claim of influence in Central Asia and for that reason "If you look at what Iran does today in Iraq, Lebanon, Syria, in Bahrain or Yemen, you cannot compare the investment the Iranians have made in the Arab world to what they've done in Central Asia."

Aryan said the only influence Iran could have, or would even be interested in with respect to Central Asia, would be economic.

The Central Asian states do have one small advantage in building relations with a post-sanctions Iran. They already have ties with Tehran, albeit to varying degrees.

A gas pipeline was built in the late 1990s connecting Iran to Turkmenistan (and another more recently) and Tehran has oil-swap arrangements with fellow Caspian littoral states Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan. The Kazakhstan-Turkmenistan-Iran railway was just inaugurated at the end of last year. Iranian companies have also invested in projects in Tajikistan, notably the Sangtuda-2 hydropower plant.

That said, many of the top officials in the Central Asian governments were once members of the Communist Party during the Soviet era and still harbor deep suspicions about theocracies.

So the road from Central Asia to Europe through Iran is not likely to open easily.

These topics and more, including much more about Iran's domestic and foreign politics, are dealt with in the audio recording of the panel session.

Embed share

Roundtable Discussion: Opportunities For Central Asia If Iran Sanctions Are Lifted

by RFE/RL

Embed share

The code has been copied to your clipboard.

The URL has been copied to your clipboard

---

No media source currently available

0:00 0:40:11 0:00

Direct link

• 48 kbps | MP3

Pop-out player

-- Bruce Pannier

Some people say you can tell a lot about a person by the way they dress. You can “dress for success” or believe “clothes make the man.”

In March, the subject of dress came up in three Central Asian countries, in one case because the clothing was “foreign” Islamic, in another too risque/Western, and in a third as a suggestion to honor the past.

We begin in Tajikistan, site of the most recent intrusion by the “fashion police,” literally.

During a celebration to mark Mother’s Day (formally International Women’s Day), it seems President Emomali Rahmon was upset by the appearance of several women dressed in long black robes traditionally worn by women in Islamic countries further south and west of Tajikistan. Some of the women reportedly wore veils, a piece of clothing that has caused a huge uproar in Central Asia for many years.

Rahmon expressed his displeasure, saying it was not “in keeping with Tajik culture and traditions.” He explained, “Our people have never worn black clothing. It’s not acceptable to wear black at traditional ceremonies,” adding, “Even clothing for mourning is not monotone black.”

The president’s disapproval spurred officials into action. On March 28, First Deputy Interior Minister Abdurahmon Alamshozoda chaired a meeting in Dushanbe with chiefs of police and other top law- enforcement officials from around the country. Alamshozoda told them to be on the lookout for women wearing “foreign clothes” and to engage in “explanatory work among the population.”

That seems to mean telling young women not to dress like Muslim women in other countries do.

Rajabboy Ahmadzoda, the mayor of Khujand, Tajikistan’s second-largest city, told RFE/RL’s Tajik Service, known locally as Ozodi, that he had given the instructions to local law enforcement and suggested “every Tajik girl should honor national traditions in their clothing.”

The Khujand city administration gave orders to raid stores and stalls selling “clothes made in Iranian or Afghan style.”

In Uzbekistan, the problem was “immodest” garb. Singer Lola Yuldasheva gave a performance at the end of February and her choice of attire caught the attention of Uzbeknavo. Uzbeknavo is the state agency in charge of giving licenses to performers -- or banning them from performing.

Uzbeknavo summoned Yuldasheva and explained the dress she wore during the February 24 concert “conflicts with the national mentality.” She was given a warning not to wear such an outfit during future performances.

On the eve of Norouz, March 21, Uzbeknavo issued a directive that female performers were no longer to wear clothing that exposed their shoulders or legs, that they were not to appear “half-naked” at public events, and that they were not to include any sexually suggestive moves on stage.

In order to avoid a repetition of the “scandalous” incident with Yuldasheva, “all female singers are to be seriously warned ahead of concerts” about their attire and “manner.”

RFE/RL’s Uzbek Service, known locally as Ozodlik, contacted the maker of Yuldasheva’s dress, 31-year-old Zulfiya Sulton. She said the dress was inspired by the “spirit of the song.” Sulton told Ozodlik, “I don’t see anything excessive and consider the criticism to be misplaced.”

Sulton said she designs clothes for stage performers, “not librarians or students at the Islamic college.”

Uzbek state television, the only television in Uzbekistan, has been regularly running programs about “foreign” or “alien” clothing for many years now and criticizes both “Western” styles of dress and Islamic clothing from other Muslims regions.

There is also a movement now in Kyrgyzstan, small so far, against revealing Western clothing being worn by young women. Those who criticize such apparel advise a return to the more traditional clothing of Kyrgyz women.

And the subject of traditional garb brings us to Kazakhstan, where “historian, writer, and propagandist of the great steppe,” Arman Nurmukhanbetov, told Tengrinews.kz that Kazakhstan needs to introduce a Day of Kazakh Dress. Nurmukhanbetov “together with a group of enthusiasts” has launched a social-network campaign to gain support for the idea.

Nurmukhanbetov wishes that the style of clothing Kazakhstan’s “ancestors wore over the course of thousands of years” should be honored and publicly displayed one day a year, which he proposed be “the last Friday of April, May, or September.”

The authorities’ attention to fashion is part of the search for -- or quest to invent -- a national identity. The governments of all five Central Asian states have been working on their national identities since the first days of independence in late 1991.

Many of the officials in Central Asia say that wearing the veil, or hijab, is not a custom of the region. Among some of Central Asia’s people it might not be -- the traditionally nomadic cultures, for example -- but those familiar with Central Asian history during the Soviet era will know about “hujum,” the forced unveiling of women in Central Asia, particularly Uzbekistan.

The Communist Party looked on the veil as a sign of the “backward and primitive”* people of Central Asia and, on International Women’s Day -- March 8, 1927 -- publicly banned women from wearing them.

The communist government forced women to take off their veil, on some occasions at gunpoint, and some of the women who did were killed by local men.

But most assuredly, some women in Central Asia did wear the veil prior to the arrival of the Russians.

Last, and certainly not least, almost every example above concerns how women dress. And the people articulating this “traditional” fashion sense are all men wearing Western suits to the office.

The traditional patriarchal system of Central Asia seems to be in no danger.

-- Bruce Pannier, with contributoins from Salimjon Aioubov of RFE/RL's Tajik Service and Shukrat Babajanov of the Uzbek Service

*From Douglas Northrop’s book Veiled Empire: Gender And Power In Stalinist Central Asia. I also recommend Marianne Kamp’s The New Woman in Uzbekistan: Islam, Modernity, And Unveiling Under Communism