Iran wants entry into China-led Shanghai Cooperation Organization
Tehran thinks membership would help deflect US sanctions and get the beat on rival Gulf states now looking East.
James M. Dorsey is a senior fellow at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies at Singapore’s Nanyang Technological University, a syndicated columnist and the author of the blog, The Turbulent World of Middle East Soccer. A veteran, award-winning foreign correspondent whose career focused on ethnic and religious conflict, James focuses at RSIS on political and social change in the Middle East and North Africa, the impact of change in the Middle East and North Africa on Southeast and Central Asia and the nexus of sports, politics and society in the Middle East and North Africa and Asia.
Tehran thinks membership would help deflect US sanctions and get the beat on rival Gulf states now looking East.
Gulf states are likely to discover that they are stuck with a less committed United States. That reality will push them toward greater self-reliance.
The Taliban’s security problems are likely to be domestic and regional rather than hail from transnational jihadist groups.
Some analysts have noted that Saudi Arabia was absent among the Gulf states that helped the United States with evacuations from Afghanistan.