Chinese Presidents Xi Jinping, Iranian President Massoud Pezeshkian and Russian President Vladimir Putin are participating on Monday in Kyrgyzstan, in Central Asia, in a summit of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) which intends to counterbalance Western influence, but several member states of which are going through major crises.
Published on: 08/31/2026 - 01:15 Modified on: 09/01/2026 - 07:29
Russian Presidents Vladimir Putin and Chinese Presidents Xi Jinping praised the relationship between Moscow and Beijing on Monday August 31, ahead of a summit in Kyrgyzstan of a regional bloc which intends to counterbalance Western influence but several member states of which are going through major crises.
Iranian leaders Massoud Pezeshkian and Turkish leaders Recep Tayyip Erdogan, as well as Indian Prime Ministers Narendra Modi and Pakistani Prime Ministers Shehbaz Sharif are also present in Bishkek, the capital of this Central Asian country, for the summit of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) which takes place until Tuesday.
“Strategic cooperation between Russia and China constitutes a model of interstate relations,” said Vladimir Putin, who spoke of in-depth cooperation in digital innovations, including artificial intelligence.
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The Chinese leader noted “the even more promising prospects” of Sino-Russian cooperation “thanks to the combined efforts of the two parties”.
According to Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov, the two men, who last met in May, only discussed the war in Ukraine in a "superficial manner", while Beijing and Moscow have strengthened their cooperation in recent years.
“We are heading in that direction,” replied Vladimir Putin, as the Russian army intensified its strikes against Ukraine.
The SCO is a growing organization bringing together ten states (Belarus, China, India, Iran, Russia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, Pakistan, Tajikistan), intended to act as a counterweight to the West, with an emphasis on security and economic issues.
New momentum for the SCO under the leadership of Beijing and Moscow
The plenary session under the aegis of Kyrgyz President Sadyr Japarov is to be held on Tuesday and a bilateral meeting is notably planned between Vladimir Putin and Massoud Pezeshkian.
The SCO has gained new momentum in recent years under the leadership of Beijing and Moscow, against a backdrop of Russian-Chinese rapprochement.
The group now has, in addition to its ten members, fifteen dialogue partners, including Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Qatar, as well as two observer states, including Afghanistan.
The founding declaration of the SCO ensures that this organization “is not an alliance directed against other states”.
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But the Russian and Chinese presidents regularly use these summits to show their unity and put forward their vision of a multipolar world, aiming to counter the American hegemony that they denounce.
This summit takes place at a time when several SCO member states are involved in open wars: the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the settlement of which after four and a half years of fighting is at an impasse, and the Israeli-American offensive against Iran launched in February.
Other member states are also engaged in trade conflicts, in particular with customs duties imposed by the Americans on Chinese and Indian products.
“Continuing the war is neither in our interest nor in that of the region”
At the end of August, the American government also took secondary sanctions against Iran's trading partners intended to suffocate the Iranian regime.
Washington has also threatened Tehran's allies. China, a major importer of Iranian oil, has warned it will “firmly defend” its interests.
During a meeting with Indian leader Narendra Modi, Iranian President Massoud Pezeshkian considered that continuing the war against the United States was not in Tehran's interest, while a first exchange of strikes between the Americans and the Iranians occurred after a month of calm.
“We are convinced that the continuation of the war is neither in our interest nor in that of the region,” he declared, after an exchange of fire at the Strait of Hormuz.
Russia is also an important partner of Iran and has intensified its military and commercial cooperation with it.
This country, which has faced American and international sanctions since the Islamic revolution of 1979, regularly asserts that economic pressures and threats will not make it bend.
The concrete benefits of participation in the SCO are uncertain because, if the SCO claims to bring together approximately 40% of the world population and 25% of the planet's GDP, this bloc remains heterogeneous and dissensions exist between its members.
With AFP
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