MFA DISCUSSES CENTRAL ASIA, AFGHANISTAN, AND

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 04 MOSCOW 000839 SIPDIS E.O. 12958: DECL: 04/02/2019 TAGS: PREL RS KZ AF ZK SUBJECT: MFA DISCUSSES CENTRAL ASIA, AFGHANISTAN, AND KAZAKHSTAN WITH U.S. AMBASSADOR TO KAZAKHSTAN REF: A. ASTANA 560 ¶B. MOSCOW 818 MOSCOW 00000839 001.2 OF 004 Classified By: Political Minister Counselor Alice Wells for reasons 1.4 (B) and (D) ¶1. (C) Summary. In a March 24 meeting with U.S. Ambassador to Kazakhstan Richard Hoagland, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Karasin reaffirmed GOR readiness to cooperate with the U.S. on Afghanistan but stressed the need for transparency and openness, particularly with regard to U.S. conversations with Central Asian countries on an alternative to Manas Air Base in Kyrgyzstan. In a separate meeting, Director of the Third CIS Department Peshkov explained his views on the meaning of Moscow's special relations with the CIS countries, the water resource problem in Central Asia, the state of Russian-Kazakh relations, and the GOR proposal for a European Security Treaty. He also clarified that the newly appointed National Coordinator for the CIS Countries, Deputy Prime Minister Shuvalov, will focus on the economic aspects of cooperation with the former Soviet Republics, while the recently created CIS agency under the MFA would be more involved in humanitarian and cultural ties. End summary. ¶2. (U) U.S. Ambassador to Kazakhstan Richard Hoagland, in Moscow for consultations while on his way to Baikonur for a space shuttle launch (ref A),met with Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Grigoriy Karasin and Director of the Third CIS Department Maksim Peshkov on March 24 to exchange views on Kazakhstan and Central Asia. Deputy Director of the Third CIS Department Sergey Kopeiko also attended the meeting with Peshkov. Cooperation on Afghanistan -------------- ¶3. (C) Karasin indicated that the GOR was watching with interest the Obama Administration's policy review on Afghanistan and Central Asia, especially the degree of linkage between the two. Affirming GOR interest in cooperation with the U.S. on Afghanistan in "all available formats," he stressed that, as FM Lavrov told the Secretary in Geneva, Russia was ready to discuss other forms of cooperation beyond the transit of non-lethal NATO goods. He indicated that when Moscow made the decision to open up the March 27 Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) Conference on Afghanistan to non-members, the United States was the first partner it thought to include. ¶4. (C) Speaking on Manas, Karasin indicated that the U.S. should talk to the Central Asian countries first if it wished to seek an alternative to the air base in Bishkek, but transparency with Russia was key. "We want to know what you are doing. When we discover arrangements post factum, it creates a sense of distrust." Karasin said the GOR was not happy with what it perceived as the U.S. tendency in the past few years to ignore Russian concerns and circumvent Russian interests, and expressed hope that our newly "reset" bilateral relationship would have openness as a key characteristic. Karasin later reiterated the loss of trust engendered by the prolonged U.S. use of Manas, which was not accompanied by regular U.S.-Russian consultations. ¶5. (C) In response to his inquiry on whether Kazakhstan was considering troop contributions to ISAF, Ambassador Hoagland briefed Karasin on Astana's exploration of the option to post senior staff officers to ISAF headquarters in Kabul, which would serve as a first step in a future decision on whether to participate gradually in ISAF operations. The Ambassador also described U.S.-Kazakh military cooperation, particularly with regard to overflight and flight diversion arrangements that have seen over 1000 overflights each year and 70 emergency landings on Kazakh territory to date. Karasin, in an apparent reference to the ongoing overflight issue between the U.S. and Russia, responded that in his personal view, Russian and U.S. military personnel should meet more often to MOSCOW 00000839 002.2 OF 004 discuss cooperation in these areas. ¶6. (C) Ambassador Hoagland, in a separate meeting with MFA Central Asia Director Maksim Peshkov, discussed with his interlocutors concrete ways to cooperate on Afghanistan transit issues. Peshkov raised an interest by the Republic of Tatarstan to offer trucks for the transport of NATO non-lethal goods as a way to relieve railway congestion from Uzbekistan to Afghanistan. Peshkov worried that the twin ports of Termez in Uzbekistan and Hairaton in Afghanistan are already clogged with containers, and the situation will only get worse (ref B). Ambassador Hoagland noted that the Nizhniy Pyanjh Bridge in Tajikistan is another port of entry into Afghanistan and could be utilized to reduce the congestion at the Termez Bridge. However, this would require an understanding between Uzbekistan and Tajikistan to ease the boarder crossing. The Ambassador wondered whether Russia could play an honest-broker role with those two countries to ease the border crossing for shipments to Afghanistan. Peshkov acknowledged the need to improve Uzbek-Tajik relations to ease transit, but demurred on the GOR's ability to exert influence. He noted that Russia was experiencing difficulties of its own in delivering humanitarian aid to Afghanistan, because the shipments were being stopped at the Russian-Kazakh border due to railway congestion in Termez. He also offered his assessment that the bilateral relationship between Tajikistan and Uzbekistan had shown improvement recently, with the two sides convening a meeting of an inter-governmental commission two weeks ago that resulted in positive discussions on water usage and border demarcation issues. Privileged vs. Special Relations -------------- ¶7. (C) Ambassador Hoagland, noting that President Nazarbayev characterized Russia as Kazakhstan's most important strategic partner in its multi-vectored foreign policy, pressed Peshkov to provide a more precise definition of the GOR's "privileged relations" with the former Soviet republics. Peshkov responded that the MFA preferred "special" over "privileged" in describing bilateral relations with the CIS countries. Such special relations emanated not only from economic ties, but also security interests due to the potential spill-over effects of events in Afghanistan and Pakistan. He made clear, however, that Russia did not consider the Central Asian countries as buffers against Pakistan, but rather as partners in guaranteeing mutual security. He suggested that perhaps Western concern over the term "privileged" was a matter of semantics -- Russia provides more aid to the Central Asian countries than to many other parts of the world; some might see this as a "special" relationship while others would call it "privileged." Ambassador Hoagland welcomed the fact that Russia did not view itself as having an exclusive right to pursue meaningful relationships with the CIS countries. Financial Crisis -------------- ¶8. (C) DFM Karasin agreed with Ambassador Hoagland's analysis that Astana, while feeling the effects of the current financial crisis, was reacting in a responsible, flexible manner. He reiterated the GOR's commitment to help the CIS countries weather the storm, including through the Eurasian Economic Community's (EurAsEc) $10 billion assistance fund, of which Russia has pledged $7.5 billion. Speaking on the financial crisis writ large, Karasin said that the GOR was looking for concrete ways out and in that regard was looking forward to directions resulting from the April 2 G20 summit in London, though understanding that there would be no magical solutions. Water a Problem -------------- MOSCOW 00000839 003.2 OF 004 ¶9. (C) In response to Ambassador Hoagland's inquiry about Russian strategy for dealing with water resource issues in the region, Peshkov joked that "the only way (was) to restore the Soviet Union." Without Moscow driving the policy as was the case in the old days, the current situation lacked balance, a problem that the GOR has been trying to address through EurAsEc for years. While the presidents of the five Central Asian countries issued a statement on water at the Bishkek Summit last year, followed by the signing of agreement on water usage by the foreign ministers in Almaty, problems on sharing water resources persists. Peshkov agreed with the Ambassador that the current arrangement of negotiating yearly agreements, which was subject to the short term political ups and downs between the five countries, was not a stable method of achieving long term solution to the problem. Recent disagreements between China and Kazakhstan over the sue of the Black Irtysh River and Afghanistan's claim to water intake from the Amu-Darya River have compounded the issue. DFM Karasin likewise bemoaned the water-energy conflict as the core issue bedeviling relations in Central Asia, while noting that many other grievances had been centuries in the making. ¶10. (C) Ambassador Hoagland, noting that he was only thinking out loud, suggested to Peshkov that this might be an area where Russian and American experts could cooperate at the technical level both to help resolve the problem and to act as an example of leadership to the countries in the region. Peshkov undertook to consider this suggestion. Russian-Kazakh Bilateral Relations -------------- ¶11. (C) Peshkov characterized the Russian-Kazakh bilateral relationship as special and strong, strengthened by the personal friendship between the two foreign ministers, as well as a developing friendship between Presidents Medvedev and Nazarbayev, similar to the one Nazarbayev enjoyed with then-President Putin. While "nothing new or revolutionary" resulted from the March 14 visit of Kazakh Foreign Minister Marat Tazhin to Moscow, he discussed at length with Lavrov the financial crisis, Afghanistan, and Kazakhstan's 2010 OSCE presidency. Peshkov said that the foreign ministers gave instructions to their deputies -- DFM Aleksandr Grushko on the Russian side and First DFM Nurtay Abykayev on the Kazakh side -- to meet and discuss the specifics of Russian-Kazakh cooperation in the OSCE. When pressed, Peshkov stated that the GOR did not know yet what Kazakhstan's OSCE priorities would be. ¶12. (C) According to Peshkov, another issue discussed between Lavrov and Tazhin was the legal status of the Caspian Sea. He indicated that while Iran was still holding to its 20% ownership claim to the Caspian Sea surface area and seabed, it privately was prepared to give up that position. However, Iran still had disputes with Turkemenistan and Azerbaijan, as well as differences of opinion with Russia on fishing rights in the Caspian Sea. European Security Treaty -------------- ¶13. (C) In response to Ambassador Hoagland's inquiry about the European Security Treaty, Peshkov recycled familiar talking points that Russia was seeking a legal framework in Europe to guarantee mutual security. While disclaiming familiarity with the issue since his department was not in charge of it, he nevertheless opined that Moscow envisioned a place for the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) in this security structure, and that the word "security" would encompass counter-narcotics, counter-terrorism, counter-extremism, economic and financial aspects. Deputy Director of the Third CIS Department Kopeiko added that Russia envisioned this treaty to build on previous agreements such as the Helsinki Accords and the OSCE Charter, but would spell out exact, legal obligations instead of non-binding MOSCOW 00000839 004.2 OF 004 declarations. Peshkov indicated that the MFA was actively preparing for the April 1 meeting between Presidents Obama and Medvedev and that this topic would certainly be among the issues discussed. Who is in Charge of CIS Policy? -------------- ¶14. (C) Commenting on the March 19 appointment of Deputy Prime Minister Shuvalov as National Coordinator for CIS Countries, Peshkov indicated that Shuvalov would focus mainly on economic issues associated with the former Soviet republics. He also clarified that the newly created Federal Agency on CIS Countries, Compatriots Living Abroad and International Humanitarian Cooperation, which was nominally under the MFA but whose head, Farit Mukhametshin, has the title of a Special Representative of the President, was still undergoing a period of organization and "self-definition." The Agency, he noted, would focus on humanitarian and cultural issues associated with the CIS states. ¶15. (U) Ambassador Hoagland has cleared this cable. BEYRLE