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OpEdNews Op Eds    H2'ed 11/7/18

Pakistan in the middle of Saudi, Iran and rival pipeline plans

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From Asia Times

As US sanctions on Iran come into force, the government of Imran Khan is carefully negotiating its position with neighbors and regional powers, each with their favored pipeline plans

Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan's maiden visit to China aimed at CPEC talks
Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan's maiden visit to China aimed at CPEC talks
(Image by YouTube, Channel: The Times of India)
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A tweet roared like announcing a blockbuster premiere and sanctions did engulf Iran on time -- despite opposition from Russia, China and the EU-3 (France, Germany and the United Kingdom), who still support the United-Nations endorsed Iran nuclear treaty.

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani has called this an economic war waged by a "bullying power."

The US has imposed sanctions on Iranian shipping, finance and energy exports, blacklisting 700 people. They target the EU special mechanism to facilitate purchases of Iranian oil, a sort of alternative international payment system, and threats persist about cutting Iran completely off the Swift system (although several Iranian banks are already suspended).

There are also "temporary waivers" related to oil exports granted mostly to China, India, Japan, South Korea, Taiwan and Turkey, plus two Italy and Greece. This means that in the real world, beyond all the bluster, there's no way to downgrade Iranian oil imports to "zero" without causing a global energy crisis.

The key exemption might as well be Chabahar port in Iran, the cornerstone of India's own mini-New Silk Road strategy for South Asia and Central Asia, which depends on exports to and across Afghanistan.

In the words of John Bolton, the US National Security Adviser, they seek to achieve a "massive change in the regime's behavior."

But is that ever likely to happen? I got a different take on this when I visited a Pakistani courtyard...

Meanwhile, in Islamabad ...

It's a balmy night in an Islamabad courtyard and, punctuated by salutary laughs, a geopolitical carousel develops among some of the sharpest minds in West Asia, Southwest Asia and South Asia. They are Junaid Ahmad from the School of Advanced Studies at the UMT in Lahore, Professor Mohammad Marandi of the University of Tehran, and Tugrul Keskin, a professor of Sociology at Shanghai University.

A Pakistani, an Iranian, a Turk and this global nomad. Inevitably our conversation swirls around the tasty possibilities of an Ankara-Tehran-Islamabad rapprochement.

We have had the privilege of being part of one of the most extraordinary conferences in recent times, "The Geopolitics of Knowledge and Emerging World Order," which could not possibly take place in a paranoid West, but only in Asia, at the relatively young National Defense University (NDU) in front-line state Pakistan.

Not to mention the extra bonus of watching Pakistani generals talk about international relations across the Global South from what is a center-left, genuinely progressive perspective.

The merit for the conference goes to gentleman-scholar Dr Ejaz Akram, professor of Religion and World Politics at the NDU, and a gifted, dedicated team.

Where else to discuss, in the same breath, the unity of Eastern civilizations in a New World Order, as exposed by Prof. Li Xiguang of Tsinghua University and a member of the Chinese Foreign Ministry Advisory Committee or be rocked by Isa Blumi, professor of Turkish Studies at Stockholm University, totally ripping apart Western silence on the genocidal war inflicted on Yemen by the "Saudi-led coalition?"

But for some of us, the real star of the show was a putative, developing alliance that could turn into a crucial game-changer in Eurasia integration. Hopeful signs are on the cards.

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Pepe Escobar is an independent geopolitical analyst. He writes for RT, Sputnik and TomDispatch, and is a frequent contributor to websites and radio and TV shows ranging from the US to East Asia. He is the former roving correspondent for Asia (more...)
 

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