In Persian Gulf littoral, cooperative security is key

Context: The geopolitical significance and persistent turbulence in the Persian Gulf demands a framework of cooperative security among the littoral to ensure durable peace.

Persian Gulf

• Definition: The United Nations defines the Persian Gulf as a water body shared by eight countries viz. Bahrain, Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates.
• Geopolitical significance: these countries are major producers of crude oil and natural gas.

History of designing a framework for the Persian Gulf:

• Before 1970: guarded by the British and administered through imperial civil servants.
• After the end of the British Era: evident rivalries and cooperation due to psychological, nationalistic, and prestige factors.
• American hegemony: asserted through Nixon and Carter Doctrine. 
• Thwarted collective security: by the Baathist Iraq at Muscat in 1975 and the subsequent Iranian Revolution disturbed the strategic balance.
• Questions over extra-regional interference: it was left to the Security Council through Resolution 598 (1987) to explore ‘measures to enhance the security and stability in the region’.

USA’s intervention (extra-regional agency).

• Flawed approach: 

• Lack of wider objectives: evident in the futility of the Iraq war and failed efforts to contain Iran through the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC).

• Declining commitments: USA’s disowning of the Iranian multilateral nuclear agreement has generated disquiet in some members of GCC.

• Hampered modus vivendi: in U.S-Iran’s relations due to regional conflicts elsewhere in the West Asian region (Yemen, Syria, and Libya).

Evolving Transformation:

• Rising divisions in GCC: 

• Due to multiple challenges: impacts of the pandemic, the decline in crude oil prices, and lack of cooperation in deciding prices through OPEC.
• Shifting power balance: Saudi Arabia is seen as a fading power and UAE, Qatar, and Iran as emerging new regional leaders.
• Reduced significance: The GCC is effectively ended, and OPEC is becoming irrelevant as oil policy moves to a tripartite global condominium.

India’s- Gulf: Links and Challenges.

• A blossoming relationship with GCC: 

• Wide-ranging relationship: Bilateral trade of $121 billion and remittances of $49 billion from a workforce of over 9 million.
• Imports: GCC suppliers account for around 34% of India’s crude imports 
• Investments: national oil companies in Saudi Arabia and Abu Dhabi are partners in a $44 billion in vestment in the giant Ratnagiri oil refinery.

• Complex Indo-Iran Relationships :

• Strained relationships due to American pressure.

• Importance to India: Iran has a geopolitical significance on account of actual or alleged roles in Pakistan, Afghanistan, Turkey and some countries in Central Asia.

• Iran’s Politico-technological potential and economic resources are significant to India.

• Eschewed Indian Involvement: in the regional disputes showcases the Indian interest does not entail power projection but aspire for stability and peace in the region through freedom of navigation.

Way Forward:

• Ensure cooperative security (not competitive security): The absence of exclusive security arrangements enhances insecurity and aggravate regional tensions.

• Respect: Statesmen should not confuse great power with total power and great responsibility with total responsibility.

• An Ideal framework for stability and security should answer some fundamental questions: 

• Security for whom, by whom, against whom, for what purpose?
• Is the requirement in local, regional, or global terms? 
• Does it require an extra-regional agency?

• The essential ingredients of such a framework would be to ensure:

• Conditions of peace and stability in individual littoral states.
• Freedom to all states of the Gulf littoral to exploit their hydrocarbon and other natural resources and export them.
• Freedom of commercial shipping in international waters of the Persian Gulf.
• Freedom of access to, and outlet from, Gulf waters through the Strait of Hormuz.
• Prevention of conflict that may impinge on the freedom of trade and shipping.