The Russian full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022 has reignited the EU’s interest in Central Asia. Meanwhile, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan are emerging from the shadows and boldly diversifying their international relations.
This takes place in a quickly evolving geopolitical context. The relations between the states of the region have much improved over the past years, yet the availability of water and energy resources provides a challenge for cooperation. Russia can be considered a systemic factor in Central Asia, and China has increasingly taken on a leadership role in the region over the past two decades as well. After the US withdrawal from Afghanistan, the states of Central Asia have re-established their relations with the Taliban. And many other parties show an interest in cooperating with Central Asia as well, such as Türkiye and Azerbaijan, Iran, and the Arab Gulf states.
While taking stock of these dynamics, the EU and the Netherlands in particular can also play a bigger role in the region. This is in line with the EU’s objective to become more of a geopolitical player worldwide. Yet if the EU is serious about this, it should substantiate its ambition through tangible and deeper engagement in a wide range of sectors that goes beyond energy and trade. In Central Asia, the EU and Netherlands in particular have a unique entry point to the region in the fields of energy security and transition, water management, agriculture, connectivity, regional security, human rights, democracy the rule of law, and regionalisation.
Towards further strengthening EU – Central Asa relations in a mutually beneficial way, this report makes the following recommendations:
Improve the positive presence of the European Union in Central Asia
Showcase the long-term commitment of the EU to Central Asia by deepening the bilateral relationship in the above-mentioned areas. While the European political attention for Central Asia has experienced its ups and downs over the years, various EU projects and serious investments have been there consistently and should be further built upon.
Organising the EU-Central Asia Summit should receive a higher priority from the EU. While this first formal summit was supposed to take place in 2024, a concrete date is still missing at the time of writing. The summit needs to be an EU priority for 2025 while simultaneously continuing to organise high-level visits to and from Central Asia.
Many EU member states, such as the Netherlands, tend to only have an embassy in Kazakhstan and should increase their presence in other countries of the region as well. First and foremost in Uzbekistan, the demographic powerhouse of the region and centrally located – bordering all other states of Central Asia. Opening an embassy office in Tashkent could be a first step toward ideally opening a fully-fledged embassy in the future.
Central Asian countries should also strengthen their presence and visibility in the EU, although this is rather a recommendation for the Central Asian governments. For many Europeans, Central Asia is still a vague and far-away region about which they know very little. Tourism promotion could be a key opportunity for changing this. If the EU and Central Asia wish to seriously strengthen their relations, they also need to make their regions and initiatives more tangible for both.
Focus on concrete projects that offer opportunities in a wide range of sectors
Taking stock of the geopolitical context of the region, the EU does not need to compete with Russia or China in Central Asia as this will be a losing battle anyway – if only due to geography. Instead of becoming sucked into a geopolitical arm-wrestling game with parties that are far more skilled and dishonest therein, the EU should act more geopolitical by increasing its cooperation with Central Asia through concrete projects in a wide range of sectors.
To mobilise public and private finance and de-risk investments, the European Commission and the EU Delegation to Kazakhstan could facilitate the launching of a Team Europe Initiative on green hydrogen with Kazakhstan, as suggested in earlier Clingendael work.[244] By combining the various projects funded by EU member states like Germany, France and the Netherlands, the EU can step up its engagement and become a valuable partner in green hydrogen.
Regarding other Team Europe Initiatives, the Netherlands in particular should consider collaborating more in the one on Water, Energy and Climate Change. This Initiative offers an opportunity to join forces in (in particular) water projects with other European partners such as Finland, France, Germany, and Italy. Currently, little to no publicity is given to the Dutch participation in the Initiative, even though the Netherlands is an active partner for water, energy and climate change related projects in Central Asia.
The Netherlands should consider extending the Matra Grant Policy Framework[245] to its embassy in Astana, for all five countries of Central Asia. This would allow the Netherlands to more substantially engage with projects in the region.
When taking steps towards a further deepening of the EU-Central Asia relationship, the EU should consider connecting this to doing more governance and rule of law projects with Central Asia. These should be directly connected to energy (security) and other areas in which the countries of the region want to cooperate. As Central Asian partners are formally still committed to the OSCE human dimension, which encompasses human rights and democracy norms, these OSCE commitments could be a framework for doing so. After all, these norms and values are what makes the EU unique compared to other actors.
Take stock of further opportunities
In setting out a long-term vision for cooperation with Central Asia, projects with the youth are a best practice. This is in particular the case with projects related to human rights and democracy, as this makes it easier to convince the authorities: who doesn’t want to work on a brighter future for the next generation?
The EU needs to further stimulate exchange programmes between European and Central Asian universities. Initiatives such as Erasmus+ and the combined Erasmus Mundus master’s programme with KIMEP University in Almaty are fitting examples, but are still rather limited compared to the wide array of opportunities that Russia and China offer to students of the region.
It would also be worthwhile for the EU to stimulate exchanges within Central Asia, so that Central Asian students meet in their own region as well instead of in Moscow or Beijing. Exchange programmes between Central Asian universities, possibly in partnership with their European counterparts, further strengthen the regionalisation of Central Asia.
The EU should consider going beyond investing in higher education in Central Asia and invest in strengthening primary and secondary education as well, which is just as important and needed. Without access to proper schooling, young people cannot enter higher education that is currently the primary focus of the EU.