News Snapshot:
The Samarkand declaration, describing Central Asia as the “core” of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO), also reflects on the challenges and aspirations common to South Asia. This includes stabilising Afghanistan. The US strategy too recognises that a “secure and stable” Central Asia would contribute “directly” to the US’s counterterrorism efforts and a “secure and stable” Afghanistan should be a top priority for the region. Facing serious divisions within, the China-led SCO does not have an ostensible anti-US tilt. However, competition between the US and China around the Indo-Pacific has eclipsed the competition — panning across an arc of Central Asia,...
