Russian Show or Saudi Reward?

Russia has always accused Saudi Arabia of supporting terrorist groups in the region. It had even given military warnings to Saudi Arabia. But why are Russia and Saudi Arabia now sitting at one table?

Every year, the St. Petersburg Assembly is held where the economic partners of Russia and, naturally, partners or governments which are not Russia’s economic partners but grounds for cooperation are predicted, are present. Agreements and letters of understandings are usually signed at this assembly. At the recent assembly, a delegation of 500 Saudis participated. Saudi Arabia’s delegation claimed that it intends to construct its relations with Russia. As a result, six military, technical and economic agreements, mainly in the area of purchasing military weapons and missile systems were signed and a letter of understanding regarding the launching of nuclear and research reactor and in some agricultural cases was also signed. This is the appearance of the issue. The fact is that this assembly is Russia’s show against the pressures exerted by the US and Europe and the sanctions imposed against it. This issue has made Russia more decisive to hold a more serious and bigger show in order to show domestic public opinion and international media that the sanctions have not affected Russia and there are still countries which intend to cooperate and sign agreements with Russia. On the other hand, what has been signed between Russia and Saudi Arabia is only a letter of understanding and there is no agreement because the transformation of a letter of understanding into executive and operational agreements takes time. Russia’s past experience of signing a letter of understanding with Saudi Arabia was not a positive one. In 2007, the government of Saudi Arabia signed a 4-billion dollar military letter of understanding with Russia in order to encourage Russia to issue a resolution against Iran and prevent it from selling S-300 missiles but it was never transformed into an agreement.

Considering the differences between Russia and Saudi Arabia, what factors are important in the future relations between the two countries bearing in mind their nuclear cooperation?

The relations between Russia and Saudi Arabia have not been positive during the past 25 years. Despite all attempts made by Russia to repair its relations with Saudi Arabia, it has not succeeded in this regard. Saudi Arabia is still the West’s ally and Russia’s attempts have been futile. It will be difficult to say that relations could become serious in the future. There are many differences between the two countries. Saudi Arabia’s support of radical Islamists inside Russia has always bothered Kremlin officials. More importantly, during the past two years the relations between Moscow and Riyadh were full of tension with regard to the issue of Syria. This tension even led to threats; to the extent that Saudi Arabia had stated that it would not allow the Sochi Olympic Games to be held and Russia’s President had talked about retaliatory military measures against Saudi Arabia. Thus, the signing of the letter of understanding between Russia and Saudi Arabia could be analyzed as exerting pressure against the US and a reward to encourage Russia to reduce its aids to Syria and its support of the Bashar Assad government and also for Russia to act as mediator in the Yemen crisis.

Other assessments talk about Saudi Arabia’s attempt to encourage Russia to stop a nuclear deal with Iran. It seems impossible that such letters of understanding would impact Russia’s policies and the issues that are vital for the Kremlin including the issue of Syria. Although Russia has certain concerns regarding the nuclear negotiations, I believe other countries like France would create more obstacles.

Will the signing of nuclear and economic letters of understanding and visits made between Russian and Saudi officials have geopolitical affects on Russia’s view of the region?

If these letters of understanding are transformed into agreements and relations are established, they could impact Russia’s view of the Middle East’s issues. Of course this impact will not be immediate. But Russia’s concentration on the region particularly on economic issues may turn Russia towards Saudi Arabia. From the view of the Russian government, if the establishment of economic and military relations with Saudi Arabia could prevent its support of radical movements in Russia, Russia would certainly pursue this path. The obstacle until now was the view of the Saudi government and its hesitance in the establishment of relations, otherwise Russia intends to have economic relations. If these relations are established, they will certainly have impacts. This is not true only about economic relations with Saudi Arabia, it is rather true about any country which would sign economic agreements with Russia.