Kazakhstan OSCE to Serve as Negotiator for Georgia

The central Asian economic power, Kazakhstan, currently holds the helms of the influential intergovernmental organization, the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE).

As the new chairman of the world’s largest security organization, Kazakh foreign minister Kanat Saudabayev expresses his agreement regarding Georgia’s agenda to resolve several flaws in the structure of the Geneva discussions, which started in 2008. Additionally, the Kazakhstan OSCE chairman also called for the continuation of the IPRM (Incident Prevention and Response Mechanism) meetings, which, at some point, discusses several aspects regarding the Georgian-Ossetian issues.

According to Saudabayev, these meetings serve an important role in promoting communication between the states involved. The Kazakh OSCE chairman also believes that the security organization can contribute to the success of these meetings.

Although Russia has yet to express its agreement towards the continuation of OSCE missions in its territories, there are strong speculations regarding Kazakhstan’s capability to convince Russian leaders and come up with a fair negotiation.

Nevertheless, Kanat Saudabayev was grateful for the cooperation of the Georgian authorities in the preparation of the OSCE Summit, which is scheduled to happen this May 2010 in Astana. Russian representative Grigol Vashadze is reportedly attending the scheduled summit.

Political analyst Ramaz Sakvarelidze is confident that the intervention of the OSCE will lift some tension between Georgia and Russia. Sakvarelidze believes that OSCE’s participation in conflict resolution, as well as its familiarization of Georgia’s internal political processes, is highly important.

Kazakhstan’s OSCE chairmanship does a lot of good for the security organization itself. The country, which is a longtime supporter of regional stability and development, has managed to maintain good relations with its neighboring countries, especially China and Russia, throughout the past years.

As a former satellite state of the Soviet Union, Kazakhstan may well be suitable to convince Russian authorities to believe that the security organization it runs is not centered on promoting western political ideologies such as regime change, but instead advocates overall regional cooperation, security, as well as economic development.