Remarks by H.E. Xi Jinping
President of the People’s Republic of China
At the 26th Meeting of the Council of Heads of State
Of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization
Bishkek, September 1, 2026
Your Excellency President Sadyr Zhaparov,
Colleagues,
It is a great pleasure to join you in Bishkek. I would like to thank President Zhaparov for the thoughtful arrangements for our meeting. Since assuming the chairmanship, Kyrgyzstan has, under the theme “Together Toward Sustainable Peace, Development, and Prosperity,” held a variety of activities with remarkable success. China highly commends all this.
August 31 and September 1 mark the 35th anniversaries of the independence of Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan. I wish to extend our heartfelt congratulations to President Zhaparov, President Mirziyoyev, and to the friendly people of Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan.
This year is the 25th anniversary of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization. Twenty-five years ago, reckoning with the hard lessons of the Cold War, confronting the real threats from terrorist, separatist and extremist forces, and heeding the earnest aspirations of the world for peace and development, countries in our region came to a prevailing consensus on working together to uphold sovereignty, security, and development interests. Our organization was founded in this context, and it has shown increasingly stronger vigor and vitality.
Over the past 25 years, the SCO has traveled an extraordinary journey. Its biggest achievement is that it has steadily grown into a new type of regional cooperation organization with the largest land area and population and enormous development potential. Its most valuable spiritual asset is that it pioneered, and has since followed invariably, the Shanghai Spirit of mutual trust, mutual benefit, equality, consultation, respect for diversity of civilizations, and pursuit of common development. Its most important experience for cooperation is that it has found the right way of coexistence featuring non-alliance, non-confrontation and not targeting any third party, enabling regional countries to build a common home together.
Twenty-five years later today, transformation not seen in a century is accelerating across the globe. The rivalry is intensifying between dialogue and confrontation, win-win and zero-sum, and multilateralism and unilateralism. The shadow of war continues to haunt the world. At such a crossroads with humanity’s future at stake, the SCO should step forward to shoulder its historical responsibility and steer the course for the future.
First, we should stay committed to putting development first, and open up the prospects for shared prosperity. We should advocate a universally beneficial and inclusive economic globalization, consolidate cooperation in traditional areas such as trade, investment, connectivity, energy and resources, and expand cooperation in emerging areas such as artificial intelligence, digital economy, green industry and green mining. We should do all this in order to deepen, substantiate and upgrade regional cooperation.
China takes the SCO as a priority area for promoting high-quality Belt and Road cooperation and implementing the Global Development Initiative. In light of the development needs of this region, we will continue to ensure the success of the SCO Digital Economy Forum, the SCO Agricultural Expo, and other events. We will develop an international AI application cooperation center with fellow SCO countries, continue to work with fellow SCO countries to increase the installed capacity of photovoltaic and wind power each by 10 million kilowatts, implement 100 technological cooperation projects with other SCO countries in the next three years, and nurture more green industry talents through China-SCO cooperation. China welcomes interested member states to take an active part in the “Big Market for All: Export to China” event series to seize the opportunities on China’s super-sized market. To facilitate trade and logistics in the region, China supports improving the performance and efficiency of the Trans-Caspian International Transport Corridor, and will establish a China-SCO port economic cooperation center in Tianjin.
Second, we should stay committed to taking security as a key goal, and foster an environment of common security. We should pursue coordinated measures to tackle traditional and non-traditional security threats. We should crack down on the three forces of terrorism, separatism and extremism, transnational organized crime, drug trafficking, and telecom fraud. We should strengthen cooperation on information security, bio-security, and outer space security. We must prevent external forces from interfering in our internal affairs, endangering our political security, and undermining regional stability.
China stands ready to work with all parties to act on the vision of common, comprehensive, cooperative, and sustainable security, and make our organization an important platform for implementing the Global Security Initiative. We believe in a sensible, coordinated, and balanced approach to nuclear security, and support a stronger multilateral partnership for nuclear safety and security. We support the early opening of the SCO’s four security centers so as to upgrade the capacity of member states in responding to security threats and challenges.
Third, we should stay committed to a people-centered approach, and cement the foundation for everlasting friendship. Diversity of civilization and culture is a salient feature of our region. We should fully appreciate the distinctiveness of every country in its history, culture, social system, and development stage, and build cooperation networks between legislatures, political parties, institutions of education, think tanks, businesses, and the media, so as to promote nongovernmental exchanges and invigorate good-neighborliness and friendship among member states.
China stands ready to work with all parties to implement the Global Civilization Initiative. We support a bigger role by nongovernmental friendship institutions such as the SCO Good-Neighborliness, Friendship and Cooperation Commission. We will host SCO forums on innovation and sustainable development, on people-to-people friendship, and on friendship cities. We will establish a China-SCO basic education cooperation center, and continue to build bridges for exchanges, mutual learning and people-to-people connectivity through Confucius Institutes, Luban Workshops and other programs.
Fourth, we should stay committed to dialogue and consultation, and strive for more equitable and orderly governance. We should always advocate that all countries, regardless of their size, are equal, and that regional affairs should be discussed by all countries to bridge differences and build consensus, properly handle differences through dialogue and consultation, and meet common challenges through multilateral collaboration. China commends and supports the Samarkand Solidarity Initiative for Common Security and Prosperity proposed by President Shavkat Mirziyoyev as well as the Initiative on World Unity for Just Peace, Harmony, and Development by President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev.
China supports the model cooperation by our organization on practicing the Global Governance Initiative. That the SCO Plus Meeting this year is focused on strengthening the role of the United Nations and building a multipolar world in itself is a successful move to that end. China calls on continuous institutional improvement of the SCO to boost its efficiency in making and executing decisions. China welcomes more like-minded countries to be partners in our joint efforts to improve regional and global governance. On Ukraine, the Middle East, Afghanistan, and other international and regional hotspot issues, China stands ready to strengthen communication and coordination with all parties, continue tackling both the symptoms and root causes of these issues, and promote political settlement.
Colleagues,
When purpose guides us, no path is too long; when resolve strengthens us, no barrier is too high. China will work with all parties to continue to hold high the banner of the Shanghai Spirit, implement the development strategy of the SCO for the next decade, and pursue development with higher quality, so as to make greater contributions to a community with a shared future for humanity.
To conclude, I congratulate Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif on taking over the chair of the Council of Heads of State. China will join hands with all member states in giving Pakistan our strong support.
Thank you.
