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The 2026 Shanghai Cooperation Organisation Heads of State summit takes place from Tuesday, September 1, in Bishkek. It is being hosted by the president of Kyrgyzstan, Sadyr Japarov, who currently holds the SCO chair. High-level meetings will also be held in the SCO Plus format.
Prior to the SCO summit, Russian President Putin is due to hold bilateral discussions with Chinese President Xi Jinping on Monday (August 31).
The SCO summit will be attended by Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko; Chinese President Xi Jinping; Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi; Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian; Kazakh President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev; Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif; Russian President Vladimir Putin; Tajik President Emomali Rahmon; Uzbek President Shavkat Mirziyoyev; as well as Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev; Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan; Mongolian President Ukhnaagiin Khürelsükh; Chairman of the Council of Ministers of Togo Faure Essozimna Gnassingbé; Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan; Laos President Thongloun Sisoulith; the Vice President of Vietnam Võ Thị Ánh Xuân; and the Deputy Prime Minister of Egypt Hussein Issa.
Representatives of international organisations include UN Secretary-General António Guterres; CIS Secretary-General Sergei Lebedev; CSTO Secretary-General Taalatbek Masadykov; Chairman of the Board of the Eurasian Economic Commission Bakytzhan Sagintaev; and Secretary General of the Conference on Interaction and Confidence Building Measures in Asia Kairat Sarybay.
The member-state session brings together Belarus, China, India, Iran, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Pakistan, Russia, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan. Combined, these ten SCO countries have a collective GDP (PPP) of about 36% of the global total (US$80 trillion) and a population of about 3.4 billion.
They will discuss pressing issues on the international and regional agenda and priority areas for the SCO’s development, as well as prospects for deepening cooperation in the political, trade and economic, transport and logistics, digital, environmental, cultural and humanitarian spheres.
Following the meeting, a ‘Bishkek Declaration’, marking the 25th anniversary of the SCO, as well as documents and decisions aimed at further strengthening multifaceted cooperation and improving the organisation’s activities, will be signed. A number of thematic statements by the heads of state will also be adopted.
At the expanded SCO Plus format, participants will exchange views on strengthening the central coordinating role of the United Nations and international law, as well as promoting sustainable development and expanding mutually beneficial cooperation.
The summit coincides with Kyrgyzstan’s Independence Day and the August 31 opening of the World Nomad Games.
The summit comes less than three months after Kyrgyzstan was elected to the UN Security Council for 2027-2028, its first term on the body. Hosting the SCO gives Japarov an opportunity to reinforce his diplomatic profile before his UN Security Council term begins in January.
What the Cholpon-Ata SCO Foreign Ministers’ Summit Already Settled
At their July 24 meeting in Cholpon-Ata, the SCO members’ foreign ministers approved a draft declaration and accompanying documents as a basis for this week’s Heads of State summit. The content has therefore largely been negotiated before the leaders arrive, although the final package can still change.
That July SCO Foreign Ministerial statement gives a clearer indication of the political agenda, supporting a multipolar world order and rejecting unilateral sanctions. It also calls for more intra-SCO trade. Terrorism, separatism, extremism, drug trafficking, and transnational organised crime remain its stated security priorities.
The statement says the SCO is entering a period of institutional reform, including changes to its legal framework and cooperation procedures.
A Development Bank Still Taking Shape
Economic cooperation will occupy a significant part of the summit. In Tianjin last year, interested member states reached political consensus to establish an SCO Development Bank. The institution is not yet operational. At the fourth consultation meeting in Shenzhen in June, delegates discussed its key elements and the next stage of negotiations.
A timetable or capital commitments announced in Bishkek would move the proposal beyond its current design stage. The bank could eventually provide another source of finance for infrastructure, but its structure and membership remain unsettled.
De-Dollarisation
Currency diversification will also be part of the discussions. The 2024 Astana Declaration called for gradual growth in the use of national currencies for settlements among interested members. Sanctions on Russia and Iran have increased the political importance of that effort, although the SCO has not created a common payment system.
The SCO Plus
The SCO has two observer states and 15 dialogue partners in addition to its ten members. The dialogue partners include Armenia, Bahrain, Cambodia, Egypt, Kuwait, Laos, the Maldives, Myanmar, Nepal, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Sri Lanka, Türkiye, and the United Arab Emirates, while observers include Afghanistan and Mongolia. The SCO Plus format allows selected partners and international organisations to join the wider discussion, but partner status does not guarantee attendance.
The expanded format increases the summit’s reach while exposing the differences inside the organisation. India and Pakistan will again sit at the same table without a bilateral meeting having been announced. Iran’s President Masoud Pezeshkian will arrive as conflict involving his country and disruption around the Strait of Hormuz continue to affect energy markets and regional trade.
The July ministerial statement condemned military strikes on Iran and called for a political settlement. That shared wording does not mean the member states have identical interests. The declaration is therefore a better indication of what members can agree to say than of what they will actually do.
What Bishkek Can Deliver
Kyrgyz President Japarov is already assured of a large diplomatic gathering and an anniversary declaration. More durable results could emerge from the bilateral meetings. Xi’s state visit is expected to include talks on the US$4.7 billion China-Kyrgyzstan-Uzbekistan railway, now under construction after decades of discussion.
New financing or cross-border arrangements for the railway would give Kyrgyzstan a concrete outcome from the week. Progress on the Development Bank or agreed reforms to SCO institutions would add weight to the multilateral package.
The summit will not resolve the conflicts involving its members, but it places Bishkek at the centre of Eurasian diplomacy as Kyrgyzstan closes its chairmanship. For the SCO as a collective, it is likely to cement the institution together while allowing some semi-official bilateral talks to take place amongst certain members without the need for a full diplomatic programme. The issue between India and Pakistan, for example, and Iran’s desire to explain its position to other SCO members and related regional parties, such as Saudi Arabia and the UAE.
There will probably be a series of regional development announcements between various SCO members – such as the China-Kyrgyzstan-Uzbekistan railway, while behind the scenes work will continue as concerns SCO institutions and issues such as creating an SCO bank.
It should be underlined that the SCO full members alone account for 36% of total global productivity and 42% of the world’s population. It is an event with far-reaching, global implications. Somewhat typically, and reinforcing the concept of a multi-polar world emerging while the Western world continues to ignore what is happening, the SCO summit will be mostly ignored in Western media, with what commentary there will be almost certainly critical and dismissive.
However, Russia’s Pivot to Asia will provide a detailed summary of the SCO meetings later this week with a full analysis of what happened and the wider implications. To make sure you receive this intelligence, a complimentary subscription, including our weekly email update, can be obtained here.
