Régis Genté
The Deal reached on August 12th by the five Caspian States is certainly historic but could turn out to be little more than a mere endorsement of the existing situation. It is unlikely that Turkmen gas will be soon exported through the Caspian “Sea”
According to several of our sources, Turkmen high officials are not showing much enthusiasm following the Caspian deal signed by the leaders of the five coastal states on August 12 in the Kazakh city of Aktau.
The signing of the 18-page convention may certainly appear historic “epochal” according to Mr.Putin after twenty-two years of negotiations.However, a miracle is unlikely, given that, for one, the reasons why the deal was impossible for more than two decades haven’t disappeared.
Finally, the deal offers little more than a framework. “The first article of the Aktau Convention reads that the Caspian is neither a lake, nor a sea but a “body of water“. “This wording circumvents the debates that made a consensus impossible since almost a quarter of a century”, explains Igor Delanoe, vice director of the French-Russian observatory in Moscow.
The 24 articles of the agreement on the legal status of the Caspian Sea leave open many questions, especially those related to the division of the seabed among the coastal states. “In many respect, the Deal endorses the existing situation.
It’s a kind of approval of the bilateral agreements that Russia, Kazakhstan, and Azerbaijan had previously signed with each other”, notes Rovshan Ibrahimov, lecturer at the Hankuk University of Foreign Studies, in Seoul (South Korea). “It was planned that the document should enshrine the intention to search for compromises and mutually acceptable solutions towards a settlement of disputes, including delimitation issues.
However, since the parties could not reach a consensus over the most disputable challenges especially concerning the division of the Caspian seabed among the national sectors, it was decided “to take these issues out of the draft text of the Convention”, confirms Lidiya Parkhomchik, Senior research fellow at Eurasian Research Institute, in Almaty (Kazakhstan).
It was a surprise for many when at the end of 2017 Mr Lavrov, the Russian minister of Foreign Affairs, announced that the five Caspian State would soon achieve an agreement .
The deal seems to have been prompted by security motivations. “Moscow and Tehran feared that the existing legal uncertainty could be used by non-regional forces to interfere in the Caspian area”, stresses Igor Delanoe.
He underlines that for example Kazakhstan would have been ready to offer Washington a logistics facility in Aktau for the transportation of military equipment for Afghanistan.The Article 3.6 states without any ambiguities the principle of “Non-presence in the Caspian Sea of armed forces not belonging to the Parties”.
Five paragraphs later, the same article asserts “navigation within, entry to and exit from the Caspian Sea exclusively by ships flying the flag of one of the Parties”.
The security issue was in fact such a priority that it seems that it pushed Moscow to make concessions on the gas transportation issue, so crucial for Turkmenistan.
The article 14.1 is probably the most unexpected one of the document. “The Parties may lay submarine cables and pipelines on the bed of the Caspian Sea”, it reads.
Commentators are divided on how to interpret it. “Officially, the parties agreed to permit to lay submarine pipelines on the seabed on the condition that projects comply with environmental standards and agreements, including with the Framework Convention for the Protection of the Marine Environment of the Caspian Sea and its relevant protocols.
As a result, once the ratification of both the Convention by all littoral states (which is still a challenge, especially for Iran), as well as that of the last protocol to Tehran Convention on environmental impact assessment in a transboundary context (signed in July 2018 in Moscow) is completed, Azerbaijan and Turkmenistan could start the procedure of drafting project documents.
However, it is difficult to estimate how long it will take to develop a reliable feasibility study on launching a Trans-Caspian Gas Pipeline [TCGP]”, as Lidiya Parkhomchik points out.
But other experts think that it Moscow managed to include in the document the necessary measures to prevent the actual construction of a TCGP. “Moscow has peppered the text with safeguards related to the issue of the preservation of the Caspian natural environment, especially in article 15.
In addition, Russia holds a second card: the Impact Assessment Protocol of the Convention for the Protection of the Marine Environment of the Caspian Sea, known as the Tehran Convention, signed in November 2003.
This Protocol was signed in Moscow last July 20, a month before the Aktau summit”, recalls Delanoe.It should enable Moscow to put its veto on any construction of pipeline accros the sea.
This seems very logical.Why would Moscow finally give the green light to Ashgabat or Astana to export their gas West… and thus allow them to challenge Russia on the so profitable European market?
At the moment, Gazprom export around 48% of its volumes to Europe (Turkey included)… And these 48% generate 65% of the Russian gas giant incomes.
Baku as well has a little interest to allow the TCGP to be built. “Azerbaijan is thinking firstly about exporting its own gas and doesn’t need the Turkmen one to compete with it on the European market.
Certainly, Azerbaijan sees its future as a hub, as its hydrocarbon production is going down.But then Baku had also to take into account Moscow’s interests: that may explain why Azerbaijan finally agreed to include in the text both the possibility to build a TCGP and in the meantime some measures that prevent its construction”, as Rovshan Ibrahimov observes.
These ambiguities look like a half-successful negotiation, for lack of a possible agreement.Between Baku and Ashgabat, there is also the question of the Serdar/Kapaz oil field, which is located near the meridian line.
Solving this issue, according to the new Convention, will be part of bilateral negotiations.Nothing new in this regard.
Finally, we can understand why Turkmen high officials are not showing much enthusiam after the August deal.Certainly, it is good that the Deal represents a first step towards any cooperation in the Caspian Sea From a security perspective, the Neutral State that Turkmenistan is doesn’t see much changes, and if it is now probably less free to cooperate with the US for example on military/logistic issues connected with Afghanistan.
On the energy side, it seems that the TCGP is just as unlikely to be built as it was before August 12.
Nevertheless, as writes Arkady Dubnov, a Russian journalist expert on Central Asia issues, “it seems that the historic consensus that made it possible to finally determine the rules of the game in the Caspian came about more as a result of the new geopolitical conjuncture in Greater Eurasia and the striving by all sides to hastily preempt an undesirable development of events, rather than by the consolidation in their desire to guarantee their national interests.
On the other hand, we are seeing historic progress in the countries standing up for these interests.At the end of the nineteenth century, the width of national territorial waters in the sea was considered to be universal: just 3 nautical miles (the average distance that a cannonball could fly).
At a larger distance, the coast guard couldn’t defend its ships.Now the countries on the Caspian Sea are permitted to defend waters that are five times bigger .”