Escalating political and military tensions between India and Pakistan over the disputed border region of Kashmir are testing the durability and international credibility of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), a Eurasian organization of eight member states, including both India and Pakistan. India’s move to revoke the special administrative status of Jammu and Kashmir in August 2019 may leave the international community uncertain about how Pakistan and India will interact in upcoming SCO joint military exercises and summits.
The SCO – originally known as the Shanghai five – was first formed in 1996 when China, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia, and Tajikistan agreed to collaborate on military and border issues. Ever since, the alliance has welcomed new members Uzbekistan, India, and Pakistan and expanded its agenda into a more comprehensive cooperation program on security, anti-terrorism, trade, economic development, cultural cooperation, and humanitarianism. SCO members also maintain cooperative relations with observer states Afghanistan, Belarus, Iran, and Mongolia as well as official dialogue partners Armenia, Azerbaijan, Cambodia, Nepal, Turkey, and Sri Lanka.
Having retained observer status since 2005, Pakistan and India officially became full members of the SCO in 2017. While Russia strongly backed India’s accession to full membership status with the SCO, China simultaneously pushed for Pakistan’s full entry into the organization. Despite the fact that the SCO members currently account for roughly 40% of the global population and 20% of the global GDP with the addition of the two latest members, they also complicate political concord among the group of eight, which commonly avoids addressing domestic political issues, such as China’s treatment of ethnic, Muslim groups in Xinjiang province. This type of non-interference with internal matters falls under the SCO’s understanding of humanitarianism – a way of cooperation which differs significantly from liberal value-based alliances among western democratic states. Since India’s and Pakistan’s conflict is a cross-border issue affecting the collaboration among SCO members, however, the SCO may be compelled to act as a mediator between the two opposing states in order to maintain the integrity of the organization.
Diplomatic ties between India and Pakistan reached a breaking point in August 2019, when India revoked constitutional Article 370, which granted special autonomy status to the Muslim-majority state of Jammu and Kashmir. Furthermore, decisions of Indian policymakers will effectively divide the state into two union territories, integrating it into India and affronting Pakistan’s claim on the region. As a result of this territorial reshuffle, Pakistan’s Prime Minister Imran Khan discontinued all diplomatic engagement with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi outside of SCO activities.
The current stalemate could potentially be tested by an SCO joint military drill held in Orenburg, Russia, in September 2019, forcing Indian and Pakistani troops to participate in conventional and counter-terrorist training operations. Previously, SCO troops gathered in Chelyabinsk Oblast, Russia, in August 2018 to exercise the annual tactical operations. This was the first time that Pakistan and India participated in a joint military drill since their independence in 1947. The 2019 cooperative exercise, however, takes place under more strained conditions as political tensions between the two warring states have reached a new climax. Notwithstanding the current crisis, India and Pakistan will both participate in the 2019 drill alongside Russia, China, and other SCO member and observer states, demonstrating compliance with SCO demands to collaborate.
Engagements that will demand a more sophisticated balancing act than these military exercises are future diplomatic meetings between the SCO member states. The next annual SCO summit will be foreseeably held in Russia in mid-2020. By then, diplomatic tensions may have cooled down if the other SCO member states have made efforts to mediate between India and Pakistan, decreasing risks of collapsing the international organization. Intricate bilateral and multilateral relations among SCO members – particularly between China, Russia, India, and Pakistan – may complicate this task; yet accepting the responsibility to ease the India-Pakistan crisis will aid the SCO in proving its significance, credibility, and durability in the international arena, even in times of political turmoil.
