President Vladimir Putin and his Chinese counterpart, Hu Jintao, will attend an unprecedented show of joint military force today amid fears that the Russian leader is trying to turn an increasingly powerful central Asian alliance into a second Warsaw Pact.
The United States will be anxiously watching the military manoeuvres - held under the auspices of the six-member Shanghai Co-operation Organisation (SCO) - from afar after its request to send observers was rejected.
Founded in 2001, the SCO, which includes the four central Asian nations of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyztan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan as well as China and Russia, is rapidly gaining a reputation as an anti-Western organisation.
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Washington has plenty of reasons to be uneasy. Founded in 2001, the SCO, which includes the four central Asian nations of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyztan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan as well as China and Russia, is rapidly gaining a reputation as an anti-Western organisation.
That image seems to be one that Mr Putin is happy to cultivate. Analysts say that the Russian president believes the organisation is emerging as a bloc that is rapidly becoming powerful enough to stand up to the West.
Russia's most pro-government newspapers, often used by the Kremlin as propaganda vehicles, yesterday proclaimed the arrival of an "anti-Nato" alliance and a "Warsaw Pact 2". At the annual SCO summit in the Kyrgyz capital Bishkek yesterday, Mr Putin praised the alliance's growing strength. "Year after year the SCO becomes a more significant factor in strengthening security and stability in the central Asian region," he said.
In a thinly disguised swipe at Washington, which mirrored earlier attacks on American "unilateralism" and "diktat", he added: "We are convinced that any attempts to resolve global and regional problems alone are useless."
For the most part, the summit's agenda concentrated on promoting energy co-operation in central Asia, whose vast resources have elevated the region's geopolitical importance. |