DUSHANBE, June 17, 2009, Asia-Plus — Speaking at a summit of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) in Yekaterinburg, Kazakh President Nurusltan Nazarbayev suggested on June 16 that a supranational unit of accounting should be introduced for SCO.
“I propose to consider the possibility of introduction of supranational unit of accounting that would be attached to the basket of the main currencies of the SCO member nations,” President Nazarbayev said.
According to him, this unit could be used in mutual trade between member nations of the Organization. “Use of a national currency as regional or reserve international currency is an outdated scheme intended for production of benefit by that country that offers its currency as the regional or reserve one,” Kazakh leader noted.
We will recall that Russian President Dmitry Medvedev noted at the summit that share of national currencies in mutual trade within the SCO should be increased in order to reduce dependence on international reserve currencies. According to him, the reserve currency should not just circulate as unit of accounting between the countries but also be used as means of financial accumulation and as financial instrument. He noted that the national currency of the Russian Federation could claim to become such an instrument in the foreseeable future.
The Shanghai Cooperation Organization is an inter-governmental organization founded on June 15, 2001 in east China”s Shanghai municipality on June 14, 2001. The Organization now groups China, Russia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan.
According to its charter, the SCO works to strengthen mutual trust and good neighborliness and friendship among member states, develop effective cooperation in a wide range of areas, work together to maintain regional peace, security and stability and promote the creation of a new international political and economic order which is fair, reasonable and democratic.
