Taking into consideration that the CIS could not offer anything more than a useful platform for regular meetings, it turned into a space of subregional political alliances and economic interstate blocks. Unlike the Union State of Belarus and Russia and the EurAsEC, which are focused on Russia, GUAM prefers uniting without Russia’s participation.
On October 10, 1997 the presidents of four states: Georgia, Ukraine, Azerbaijan and Moldova, during the summit of the EU countries, signed a Communique about the creation of the regional association GUAM (Pomfret, 2007). The very fact that the creation of the regional association of countries, situated in the post Soviet territory, took place during the EU summit points to the direction chosen by its member states. GUAM presented itself as an "informal alliance" (Silaev, 2006) for regulation of transportation of the Caspian hydrocarbons through the created Transcaucasian transport corridor (Kubicek, 1997).
However, it is considered that the creation of GUAM was as an attempt at counteraction of the four states’ leaders in opposition to domination of Russia in the post-Soviet territory. The main objective of the given block is creation of alternative transport and power corridors which would bypass Russia (Transport Corridor Europe-Caucasus-Asia and the Eurasian oil corridor) (Sakwa & Webber, 1999). Aside from this objective, the member states planned to settle territorial conflicts in Abkhazia (Georgia), Nagorny Karabakh (Azerbaijan) and Dniestr region (Moldova).
The decision to bypass Russia has been motivated not only by political reasons, but also economic. Oil from either Kazakhstan’s Caspian shore or Azerbaijan’s own oil is to be transported by “Baku-Supsa” oil pipeline (see Figure 7) from Azerbaijan through Caucasus and Black Sea to Ukraine and possibly further, into Poland, that is Europe. Thus, the oil pipeline will run through three of four GUAM countries and bypass Russia. No doubt, this relatively big project should bring economic benefits to the GUAM participating countries and ease Ukraine’s dependence on the Russian energy sources.
7
Figure 7. Export routes of the Caspian oil. From “Ukraine and the Caspian. An opportunity for the United States,” by O. Oliker, 2000, RAND Issue Paper IP-198, p.2.
It is noticeable that in the first place the member states aim to develop ties between each other and act in their own interests. Interestingly, in their declaration GUAM members intend to start cooperation “for the sake of a stable and secure Europe” (GUAM Joint Communique, 1997).
The Declaration itself was based on the principles of “respect for sovereignty, territorial integrity, inviolability of state frontiers, mutual respect, cooperation, democracy, supremacy of law, and respect for human rights” (GUAM Joint Communique, 1997). In two years, in April 1999, during the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) summit in Washington, Uzbekistan was accepted to GUAM. It should be noted that Uzbekistan is a country situated in Central Asia; therefore its intentions when joining GUAM are motivated rather politically than economically. Perhaps for this reason Uzbekistan had not been a member of the organisation for a long period of time, as in 2002 it had suspended its membership and eventually left the alliance (Silaev, 2006). During this three year period the organization had been called GUUAM. And again
attention should be paid to the states’ decision to accept their new member during the summit of NATO, which is one of the organisations Russia does not favour, to say the least.
These actions and the functioning of an organisation with a critical approach to integration in the CIS had its negative influence on the Commonwealth. In addition, GUAM actively engages itself in cooperation with the USA in such areas as trade, transport, border and customs control, fighting against terrorism, organised crime, and illegal drug and arms distribution (Rakhmatulina, 2004).
On July 20, 2002, the GUAM member states signed an agreement on creation of a free trade zone (Eurasian Home, 2004). Tariffs, tax rates and quantitative restrictions were supposed to be removed in trade between members. However, as of now the states have not come to an agreement regarding the free trade zone. One of the difficulties that impeded its creation is the relatively small economies of the three of its members: according to the World Bank data (2008b), the total GDP of Moldova, Azerbaijan and Georgia makes up only $45.8 billion USD. This is about one third of Ukraine’s GDP alone. Also as shown by the World Bank (2008a) data on economies’ income level, all the four GUAM member states happen to be in the “lower-middle-income economies” group, while the three states of the CES (Belarus, Russia, Kazakhstan) are in the “upper-middle-income economies” group. Other barriers standing in the way of free trade are the same as those for the CIS, that is difference in tariff rates, standards, presence of industries highly protected by governments, weakly developed manufacturing industry and so on.
After Uzbekistan made the decision to quit the alliance in 2002, there was a period in GUAM’s activity when, as characterised by Rakhmatulina (2004), integration processes in the alliance were rather “idle” (p.121), because no significant activities had taken place during this period.
However, this situation had changed by the end of 2004 after the “Orange revolution” in Ukraine (Larrabee, 2007, p.55). The country’s new government chose to integrate with Western Europe (Informant 2, personal communication, February 22, 2008). It should
earlier as well. The causes can be attributed to the fight for leadership in the region, Russia’s disapproval of Ukraine’s decision to seek integration with Europe, as well as Ukraine’s reluctance to integrate with the post-Soviet countries for economic and political reasons. Thus, this situation arose long before the current government came to power. For instance, Sakwa and Webber (1999, p.402) note that the former presidents of Ukraine, Kravchuk and Kuchma, “have been essentially distrustful and have viewed the CIS as an instrument of Russian influence”. Therefore the line of policy conducted by the Ukrainian government should be interpreted taking into account the historical momentum.
Eventually, the GUAM member states made a decision to change the organisation’s name. In May, 2006 the name GUAM and consequently the status was changed to “Organization for democracy and economic development – GUAM” (Rouseau, 2008). Whether these changes have significant weight and power to help achieve the organisation’s aims is yet to be discovered.
Together with the EurAsEC and CES, GUAM contributes to the political pluralism on the post Soviet space. Having different strategy, structure and approach, GUAM chases its own opportunities in cooperation with Europe. However, at present GUAM acts in a rather similar way to the CIS: it is a useful association in terms of discussing important economic, political matters, but when it comes to real action, it leaves much to be desired.