The Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) repeats the G20 decisions.
Yesterday a session of the Council of the SCO Heads of Government finished its work in Beijing. The SCO unites Russia, China, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan. It is increasingly becoming an economic rather than a political organisation. The Council's decisions are increasingly similar to the measures taken by the G20 to overcome the global crisis. Russia's Deputy Foreign Minister Alexei Borodavkin said after the meeting: "The emphasis is being transferred to the SCO economic activities."
Yesterday the SCO members adopted a joint decision on overcoming the consequences of the crisis, which provides for coordination of their anti-crisis measures at government level.
Prime Minister Vladimir Putin explained at the meeting that "they are planning to establish a headquarters responsible for implementing the SCO long-term programme of multilateral trade and economic cooperation."
An attempt to set up a supervisory body also copies the decisions of the G20 summits. Like the G20, the SCO countries are going to extend the functions of the Beijing-based Secretariat. In other words, the SCO economies will be monitored from China. Mr Putin explained that the Secretariat will now be responsible for regularly submitting statistics and analytical reports on the economies of the SCO countries based on the information supplied by them. "This would allow us to better coordinate our joint efforts in solving, above all, social and economic problems." Mr Putin added.
In the near future the SCO countries will complete the accommodation of documents on the SCO special account, which will fund SCO projects on the energy industry, transportation and telecommunications. "For the time being the SCO budget only provides for financing the Secretariat's operation," Mr Borodavkin said.
The SCO finance ministers will determine the scale of financing the relevant projects from this account before the end of the year. "This subject is being discussed by government bodies so far," said VEB (Vnesheconombank) CEO Vladimir Dmitriyev. He explained how this will be done: "A special account will be opened in a bank to correspond with the accounts of other authorised banks. It will be possible to monitor the appropriate use of funds."
For the time being SCO investment projects are funded by development banks. "We have agreed with the Council to establish a common foundation for funding investment projects - 35 projects worth more than $6 billion. These are projects, which could be potentially launched in the SCO countries," Mr Dmitriyev said.
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Gas victory
Prime Minister Vladimir Putin held a news conference upon completion of his visit to China yesterday. He said that the Russian delegation negotiated advantageous terms for selling gas to China. Mr Putin said that gas will be supplied in two directions - western and eastern (30 billion and 38 billion cubic meters, respectively). "Gas supplies in the western direction will start before 2015; the sides may start supplies in the eastern direction from 2015, and it may take them from two to three years to organise them," Mr Putin said, adding that this process can be accelerated, if there is a will.
The Prime Minister said the Russian delegation has scored the main victory on price. "The agreement has been reached. Yesterday Gazprom and its Chinese partners agreed that a price on gas will be linked to the Asian oil basket," he said.
Russia insisted on this term whereas Chinese were planning to buy gas at a lower price. Mr Putin said his personal relations with Chinese leader Hu Jintao were helpful in this respect. "A good atmosphere is being created at negotiations on intricate issues, although reaching agreement is not easy." He said that Chinese are very tough negotiators and sometimes the sides rave themselves hoarse.
When asked about settling accounts with China on energy exports in national currency, Mr Putin said: "We discussed this possibility with China. Our power engineers, in particular Gazprom, raised this issue. We can consider payments in roubles but our Chinese partners must have them. We can also buy something for RMB but we must establish a balance."
Andrei Biryukov