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Russia, Iran: Stepping on the
gas
By Hooman Peimani
On
September 19, Genadi Zodanov, leader of the Russian
Communist Party and member of its parliamentary faction,
described Iran as Russia's strategic ally and stated
that Russia's parliament, the Duma, would oppose any
effort to end Russia's nuclear cooperation with Iran.
In tune with his vision for a strategic
alliance, Zodanov called on Russia and Iran to create a
natural gas version of the Organization of Petroleum
Exporting Countries (OPEC), with the cooperation of the
Persian Gulf gas producers to control international gas
prices. The proposal reflects a growing interest among
Russian political and business leaders in further
expanding ties with Iran for strategic reasons as
American political and military pressure on Russia is
increasing.
Given the American policy of
isolating Iran, any growth in the already extensive
Russian-Iranian relations will help worsen conflicts
between Russia and the United States on many issues of
importance to both, including the export of Caspian oil
and gas.
Zodanov's statements were not
surprising. Since the Soviet Union's fall in 1991,
various political, economic and security needs and
realities have compelled Russia to forge a friendship
with its large neighbor Iran, which has its own
compelling reasons for amicable ties with Russia.
Russian-Iranian relations have since grown steadily to
include a wide range of military and non-military areas,
including economic, political and scientific ones. Thus,
Zodanov's expression of the Duma's support of Russia's
non-military nuclear cooperation with Iran is well
within the practice of his country, as evident in its
ongoing construction of Iran's first nuclear power
reactor in the Persian Gulf port of Bushehr, apart from
its recent expression of readiness to build more
reactors. Constant American pressure has so far failed
to stop the Bushehr project.
Likewise, energy
cooperation has been one of the major areas of
Russian-Iranian relations. A well-known example was
Russia's joining France and Malaysia in 1997 to develop
Iran's South Pars offshore natural gas field in the
Persian Gulf, despite the Americans' threat of imposing
economic sanctions on the three countries for violating
the D'Amato Act. This American congressional act aims to
prevent the development of the Iranian and Libyan energy
industries by banning American firms from investments in
and punishing non-American companies investing more than
US$20 million in those countries.
As Russia and
Iran respectively own the world's first and second
largest natural gas reserves, it simply makes sense for
them to form an organization of gas exporting countries
with the Persian Gulf countries possessing significant
gas reserves. Qatar, especially, with the world's third
largest gas reserves, is a natural membership candidate.
Those three countries - Russia, Iran and Qatar -
possess about half the proven global natural gas
reserves. By coordinating their strategies within a
gas-exporting organization, they could surely have a
major impact on international gas markets. Among other
things, they could easily impose rules and regulations
on gas production, export and prices to end or, at
least, minimize the current fierce rivalry among a
growing number of gas exporters.
By cooperating
with Iran on non-military nuclear projects and exploring
an alliance on natural gas, Russia seems intent on
finding and exploiting the pressure points in its
relationship with the US. That relationship has
experienced tensions because of a growing conflict of
interest between the two sides. In particular, various
events over the past few months have revealed a split
between Russia and the United States after a relatively
long period of stable relations in the post-Soviet era.
Briefly, they included the growing American military and
political presence in Russia's vicinity and the
Russians' bid to expand their economic ties with the
axis of evil members, Iran, Iraq and North Korea.
Russia's conflict with the United States over
its ties with those countries and over the American
policy towards them, especially towards Iraq, have both
demonstrated and further contributed to a schism in
Russian-American relations. However, other rising
issues, such as the export of Caspian oil, will
certainly add fuel to their conflicts. After over eight
years of delay, the construction of the
Baku-Tiblisi-Ceyhan oil pipeline began in mid September
to create yet another source of conflict.
If its
construction continues, the pipeline will connect
Azerbaijan's oil fields, via Georgia, to Turkey's
Mediterranean port of Ceyhan, from where oil tankers
will deliver Azeri oil to the international markets. The
pipeline is meant to secure a long-term oil export route
not only for Azerbaijan, but eventually also for the
other major Caspian oil producers (Kazakhstan and
Turkmenistan), while bypassing Iran and Russia, although
those Caspian countries offer shorter, safer and cheaper
export routes to the Caspian oil exporters. Thus, the
pipeline will deny them a significant amount of annual
revenues in transit fees and deprive them of an
additional source of power and influence in the Caspian
region. These strategic political and economic
objectives have justified the American government to
push for its construction, despite its deficiencies.
Being constructed by Western oil companies with
clear anti-Iranian and anti-Russian objectives, there is
no doubt that its completion will worsen the existing
sentiment of mistrust and suspicion towards the United
States, the main promoter of the pipeline, in both
Russia and Iran. The American oil companies will be the
pipeline's major beneficiaries, if its construction
continues as planned and if it becomes fully operational
in 2004.
Zodanov's hope for a
Russian-Iranian-led natural gas equivalent of OPEC may
well come true in the near future, for its tempting
merits. Apart from its economic benefits, such an
organization will certainly increase the regional and
international status of the two dissatisfied regional
powers as many parameters, including low cost and
environmental considerations, are contributing to a
growing global demand for natural gas.
Needless
to say, a richer and more influential Russia will be
more assertive in pursuing its national interests, which
will ensure collisions with the United States over their
conflicting interests. However, even if this scenario
does not materialize, there is no doubt that the
Duma-backed growing Russian-Iranian relations,
especially in the non-military nuclear field, will
guarantee further tensions and conflicts in
Russian-American relations.
Such uneasy
relations will likely make the Russians more prone to
challenge the Americans over issues of strategic
importance. That will make the Baku-Tiblisi-Ceyhan
pipeline a source of conflict, given its built-in
American objective of denying Russia and Iran economic
gains and political influence in the Caspian region to
which they belong.
Dr Hooman Peimani
works as an independent consultant with international
organizations in Geneva and does research in
international relations.
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