SCO a vehicle for peacemaking and prosperity-making: analyst

Chinese President Xi Jinping (R) meets with Russian President Vladimir Putin ahead of the 16th Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) Council of Heads of State meeting in Tashkent, Uzbekistan, June 23, 2016. [Photo/Xinhua]

As India and Pakistan join the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) economic and military alliance, political analyst Eric Draitser discusses Washington's shrinking global influence.

"The SCO is really seen, in many ways, as sort of the vehicle by which Russia and the Chinese moved closer together," Draitser said. "This multilateral, international organization provides a potential platform, a potential forum for conflict resolution."

"I think we have a new potential vehicle for peacemaking and prosperity-making," he suggested.

The inclusion of India and Pakistan is the first expansion since the 2001 founding of the SCO. Taken with other recent economic unions, Russia, China, and many former Soviet republics are seeking to provide for their own opportunities.

"I think there are a number of reasons why there is a potential for a lasting alliance here," he says. "If you take these things together, what you see is one cohesive and coherent strategy for the creation of an antidote to the West."

Despite political conflicts between India and Pakistan, a new partnership between the two nations could work to prevent Washington's ability to meddle in Asia.

"Can these seemingly disparate issues be, sort of, coalesced into one formal relationship? Ultimately, that's what would benefit all of these countries, and, in my view, that's what the United States fears more than anything else," Draitser says.

Iran could be the next nation to join the SCO.

"If we see that, what that allows Iran to do is to access major investment that is non-Western," he says.