The Turkic Corridor: A Likely New Force in the Eurasian Continent
On November 12, 2021, a group of Turkic states that had been meeting regularly for 30 years reorganized itself into the Organization of Turkic States (OTS). Three months later, Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
Ironically, Ukraine’s tragedy had unintended benefits for the new members of the OTS. With the European Union (EU) imposing sanctions on goods transiting Russian territory, the route between Asia and Europe that passed through Central Asia and the South Caucasus emerged as an alternative, and in the four years since, this corridor has seen a rapid expansion of infrastructure. The route coincidentally also runs through the territories of the OTS members, which has given the Turkic states a new basis for cooperation along with the possibility of greatly enriching themselves as they reclaim their place as a premier global trade route.
How far these Turkic states can cooperate remains to be seen and there are countries who have reasons to obstruct this group from becoming a formidable bloc in the center of the Eurasian continent. This article outlines the emergence of the OTS, its prospects for facilitating real cooperation among its members, and the challenges it will face in doing so.
From Talk Shop to Bloc
The first Turkic Speaking States summit was held in Ankara at the end of October 1992. Turkish President Turgut Ozal hosted the presidents of Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan. It was an important event for the Turkic former Soviet republics, all of whom were struggling to cope with independence that none had expected. Turkey’s push to bring them all together based on their common history and linguistic affinities was a comforting gesture in uncertain times.
More summits followed; in Istanbul in 1994, in Bishkek in 1995, in Tashkent in 1996, in Astana in 1998, and Baku in 2000, but the group did not advance its goals and remained an organization that focused on past shared heritage rather than plans for a common future. Interest began to wane. When the organization rebranded itself as the Cooperation Council of Turkic Speaking States, in 2009, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan declined to join.
A decade later, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan envisioned an organization that would be more of a contemporary political and economic bloc with international influence and started discussions with other Turkic state leaders about trade and security. Uzbekistan joined the Cooperation Council of Turkic-Speaking States, or Turkic Council for short, in 2018.
On November 12, 2021, there was a Turkic Council summit in Istanbul and the group again changed the name, this time to the Organization of Turkic States. The member states were Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Turkey, and Uzbekistan. Hungary was admitted as an observer and Turkmenistan in 2021 and North Cyprus in 2022 later joined in the same capacity.
The declaration the OTS released in November 2021 included a “Vision of the Turkic World” leading up to 2040 and had large sections devoted to “cooperation in political, foreign policy and security issues,” and “economic and sectorial cooperation.”
It was clear the OTS was aiming for something higher than previous iterations of the Turkic states, but there were questions about how committed the member states were toward reaching the goals the new organization set in the declaration.
Just over three months later, the Kremlin sent waves of troops into Ukraine and new opportunities opened up that compelled the OTS to make good on promises of cooperation.
Opening Up the Middle Corridor
The Middle Corridor refers to the network of roads, railways, and maritime routes that connect Europe and China through Central Asia and the South Caucasus. The trade corridor is a compilation of infrastructure projects that started in 1999 with the Asian Development Bank’s Central Asia Regional Economic Cooperation (CAREC) program.
CAREC aims to improve connectivity between the 10 CAREC countries that include all five Central Asian states, Azerbaijan, and Georgia (the other three are China, Mongolia, and Pakistan). CAREC has six corridors that run east-west and north-south through the 10 countries, plus Afghanistan, which was part of the CAREC group until the Taliban returned to power there in August 2021. China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) is also part of the Middle Corridor as are the Trans-Caspian International Trade Route (TITR), and the Lapis Lazuli Corridor that runs from Afghanistan through Turkmenistan, across the Caspian Sea to Azerbaijan, Georgia, and Turkey to Europe.
So long as the “Northern Corridor,” the route from Asia to Europe through Russia, was open there was no rush to develop the Middle Corridor. After the EU imposed sanctions on goods transiting Russian territory in early 2022, there was new focus in Europe and Asia in expanding the Middle Corridor transportation infrastructure as an alternative West-East trade route. The Middle Corridor received a further boost in late 2023 when Houthis in Yemen started launching attacks on commercial ships in the Red Sea, forcing many vessels to take the much longer route around the southern tip of Africa.
The countries of the Middle Corridor are essentially the OTS countries with Turkey becoming a major hub on this East-West trade route.
Tajikistan is part of the Middle Corridor but is not a Turkic state, Tajiks have Persian ancestry. However, Tajikistan is located in the southeast corner of Central Asia and is connected to China through the high Pamir Mountains by only one road that is impassible for many months of the year due to snow and avalanches. Georgia is also part of the Middle Corridor and also not a Turkic state, but Tbilisi has been working closely with railway companies in Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan, and Turkey to expand railway traffic. The first freight train from China to Turkey crossed through this route in early July 2024.
Emerging Turkic Unity
Excluding OTS observers Hungary and North Cyprus, but including observer country Turkmenistan, the combined population of the OTS countries is some 175 million people, or roughly 35 million more people than Russia’s population.
Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan, and Turkmenistan have large reserves of oil and natural gas. These three could provide for the energy needs of the other OTS members. Turkey has been building up its defense industry in recent years. It is now the world’s 11th largest arms exporter. All the Turkic states in Central Asia and Azerbaijan purchase Turkish arms. Turkey is manufacturing Anka military drones in Kazakhstan under a 2022 agreement, and sells military drones to Kyrgyzstan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan. Azerbaijan’s successful use of Turkish-made Bayraktar TB2 drones against Armenian forces in the 2020 Nagorno-Karabakh war drew huge international attention to, and subsequent sales of, Turkish drones.
Azerbaijan and the Central Asian countries have been strengthening their military ties as well. In July 2024, some 4,000 soldiers from Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan participated in the first-ever “Union” military exercises near the Caspian coast in Kazakhstan’s Mangystau Province. The exercises simulated liberating an area that had been seized by a terrorist group while simultaneously guarding key infrastructure and maritime shipping. Notably, Caspian littoral countries Russia and Iran were not invited to observe the exercises. Russian media outlet Lentv 24 complained ahead of the exercises that “at a minimum, Caspian countries should be invited to see how ‘actions will be conducted to carry out combat training tasks in the direction of defining the zone of armed conflicts.’”
The same group of five countries conducted Union-2025 military exercises in Uzbekistan in October 2025. Later that same month, there was the first-ever meeting of Central Asian defense ministers in Samarkand, with the Azerbaijani defense minister present also. At the Seventh Consultative Meeting of Central Asian leaders in Tashkent in mid-November, Azerbaijani leader Ilham Aliyev attended, and his country was added to the group, turning the C5 into the C6.
Troops from Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, and Uzbekistan were among more than 40 countries that took part in Turkey’s EFES-2024 military exercises in April and May 2024. Additionally, since 2022, troops from Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Pakistan, Qatar, Turkey, and Uzbekistan have participated in “Eternal Brotherhood” exercises in Turkey in 2022, Pakistan in 2023, Kazakhstan in 2024 and Azerbaijan in September 2025.
Obstacles to Turkic Unity
Turkey, with the largest population among OTS countries, as a NATO member, and with President Erdogan being the oldest of the OTS leaders, would seem to be the natural head of the OTS. Erdogan seems to believe this.
However, none of the Central Asian countries or Azerbaijan are seeking a “big brother,” after casting off colonial master Russia. So, Turkey’s role in those countries, while increasing substantially since February 2022, has limits: the other OTS members are unlikely to simply bow to Turkey’s wishes.
Turkey (and also Azerbaijan) has been frustrated in its attempts to convince Turkmenistan to build a trans-Caspian gas pipeline to supply gas to Europe using pipelines from Azerbaijan to the Trans-Anatolian National Gas Pipeline (TANAP) that runs across Turkey. Erdogan, and Azerbaijan’s Aliyev, visited Turkmenistan in December 2022, to discuss shipping anywhere from 12 to 30 billion cubic meters (bcm) of Turkmen gas to Europe via Azerbaijan and Turkey, but the meeting with Turkmen President Serdar Berdimuhamedov did not result in any agreement.
Turkey did not give up on trying to convince Turkmenistan to ship gas through Turkey to Europe. In May 2024, Turkish Energy and Natural Resources Minister Alparslan Bayraktar said his country, Azerbaijan, and Georgia were ready to transport Turkmen gas to Europe and in June that year, Turkish company BOTAS and Azerbaijan’s SOCAR signed an agreement covering transit of Turkmen gas to Europe. By the end of July 2024, Turkish Energy Minister Bayraktar seemed to concede a deal for large volumes of Turkmen gas for Europe would not be reached soon. During a visit to Turkmenistan at the end of the month he discussed shipments of 1.5-2 bcm of Turkmen gas to Turkey via a swap deal involving Iran though Bayraktar still held out hope that annual shipments could rise to 15 bcm annually.
Turkmenistan did start shipping small amounts of gas to Turkey in March 2025, but the shipments lasted only a few months before US objections to Iran’s role in the deal halted the arrangement.
Shortly after the first EU-Central Asia summit in Samarkand on April 3-4, 2025, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan diplomatically recognized the Greek-run Republic of Cyprus. Turkish officials were quiet about the move but media in Turkey and other countries pointed to the recognition as “effectively burying Ankara’s efforts to use the OTS as a vehicle for recognition of the occupied north.” That might be overstating the situation somewhat since North Cyprus remains an OTS observer.
Erdogan and Aliyev have been frequent visitors to Central Asia since February 2022 and the leaders of the Turkic Central Asian countries have visited Turkey and Azerbaijan, some of them several times.
Since the landmark summit in Istanbul in 2021, the OTS has held summits in Samarkand in 2022, Astana in 2023, Bishkek in 2024, and Gabala in 2025. There was also an extraordinary summit in Ankara in March 2023 to discuss OTS member states’ help to Turkey in the aftermath of the devastating earthquake there the previous month. There was an informal OTS meeting at Shusha, in Azerbaijan’s Karabakh region in July 2024, and another in Budapest in May 2025.
The Promise and Threat of the Turkic Corridor
At the OTS summit in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan in November 2024, Erdogan said the member states will work to make this the “Century of the Turkic World.” Unity among the Turkic states would make the group a formidable presence in Eurasia.
Turkic states form a band that stretches from western China to the Mediterranean Sea. Relations among these states are at an all-time high and with the economic opportunities the Middle Corridor represents for these countries, there is good reason to believe their bonds will strengthen in the coming years. Erdogan wanted an organization that would have international clout, and the OTS is on the way toward achieving that goal.
Other countries might not welcome such a development. Russia was the main land route for trade between Europe and Asia until the full-scale war on Ukraine and subsequent EU sanctions. Russia’s potential is still far greater than the Middle Corridor, but the infrastructure of the latter is growing and improving practically every day. There are not many scenarios of an end to the war in Ukraine that would see the EU lift its sanctions on goods transiting Russia anytime soon. It could be decades. And during that time the Middle Corridor’s freight volumes will continue to grow and transit times will continue to decrease. China’s involvement in building up the potential of the Middle Corridor helps shield this rival trade route from Moscow’s potential meddling, but the Kremlin is surely displeased with the rapid expansion of the Middle Corridor.
More troubling for both Russia and China is the possibility that Turkic unity is solidified by the OTS, and the filling of state coffers in member states from the increased trade and transit fees, would present a model of success based on ethnic kinship. In 2025, Kazakhstan’s GDP per capita ($14,770) surpassed Russia ($14,260), according to the IMF. Turkey’s GDP per capita ($18,230) is higher than in Kazakhstan. The other OTS members are significantly far behind at the moment, but all can expect to see their GDP per capita grow noticeably as the Middle Corridor opens. The OTS members, and observer Turkmenistan, have the agricultural, energy, mineral, and industrial resources to make the OTS, as a bloc, nearly self-sufficient, if they cooperate in sharing these resources. That could help shield them somewhat from global economic and political crises.
If the Turkic peoples in the OTS and Middle Corridor form a successful political and economic bloc it could attract the interest of other Turkic peoples living close by. Russia has Tatars, Bashkirs, and Chuvash, for example. China has Uyghurs as well as more than 1 million ethnic Kazakhs and 200,000 Kyrgyz just over the border from Central Asia in the western Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region. Having a powerful Turkic bloc on their doorsteps would be reason for Russia and China to be concerned, especially as the Turkic peoples in those two countries have faced discrimination and repression.
It is still the early days of this transformation from what was essentially a cultural organization into a geopolitical and economic bloc connecting Europe and Asia, but there has been substantial progress towards this end in a short period of time and the momentum is increasing. The Turkic world is rising and could soon become a new force in the Eurasian continent.
Image: Samarкand hosts 9th Summit of Organization of Turкic States, Nov. 2022. Image Credit: President.az, CC BY 4.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0>, via Wikimedia Commons