---
title: 'Twenty-Five Years of Eurasian Co-Existence Under the Banner of SCO'
url: 'https://thediplomaticinsight.com/25-years-eurasian-coexistence-under-sco/'
author: 'Muhammad Mahad Samija'
date: '2026-06-15T16:24:09+05:00'
categories:
  - 'Eurasia'
  - 'News Analysis'
---

# Twenty-Five Years of Eurasian Co-Existence Under the Banner of SCO

The leaders of China, Russia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan gathered in Shanghai to formalize what had been an informal dialogue mechanism into the Shanghai Cooperation Organization on June 15, 2001.

Today, on the occasion of its silver jubilee, the SCO is a very different entity from what its founders could have imagined: a large, 10-member block which somehow keeps working despite the failure of other regional organizations of similar size.

The SCO was founded on a dialogue platform known as “Shanghai Five,” created in 1996 by Kazakhstan, China, Kyrgyzstan, Russia and Tajikistan. The initial concern of its founders was pragmatic and limited, aiming to settle old border issues and to develop military confidence in border areas between China and its newly independent Central Asian neighbors.

Commerce naturally followed; trade and transit between nations and infrastructure connectivity along the shared landmass. The political dynamics were not problematic because there was no fundamental competition among the original members who were all neighbors.

That changed in 2017. Both India and Pakistan’s membership of the SCO may be interpreted as a power-balancing within the SCO, but the immediate effect was the addition of the most volatile duo in the consensus-based organization.

**Read More: [SCO Friendship Commission Convenes Virtual Meeting to Mark 25 Years of the Organization](https://thediplomaticinsight.com/sco-friendship-commission-25-years-virtual-meeting/)**

Since the birth of the two countries as nations, India and Pakistan have chosen to remain on opposing sides and that hostility has effectively paralyzed SAARC – the South Asian regional organization. The obvious apprehension was that the SCO would become what SAARC was, a platform which is in the grip of two nuclear powers who will veto every common statement, turning it into a forum for bilateral grievance.

It has not yet happened, and the structural explanation is obvious. The chances of the India-Pakistan conflict having a negative impact on the SCO are low for two reasons: Firstly, unlike SAARC, the SCO is driven by China and Russia and these two are actively interested in maintaining its importance and influence for their own interests.

Secondly, unlike SAARC, the SCO does not have such a narrow membership base. In the absence of a third player to keep the engines running, India and Pakistan stand deadlocked in SAARC. In the SCO, Beijing and Moscow offer up that gravitational center, not out of altruism, but because it meets their strategic needs in part in Central Asia, for challenging the Western institutional dominance, and in the management of the AfPak security space on their periphery.

The rivalry between the two countries, India and Pakistan, is recurring in the communiqué negotiations and has not been allowed to shape the organization.

**Read More: [SCO Public Diplomacy Center Hosts Women’s Voice Forum in Uzbekistan](https://thediplomaticinsight.com/sco-public-diplomacy-center-women-voice-forum/)**

The most significant institutional developments of the SCO has been the progression from a club for border management to a complete counterterrorism structure. The first of the agreements signed was the Shanghai Convention on Combating Terrorism, Separatism and Extremism, followed by the creation of the Regional Anti-Terrorist Structure and the regular Peace Mission joint military exercises, which resulted in the realization of concrete achievements in the fight against separatism, extremism and transnational organized crime.

Coordinated in Tashkent in 2005, RATS has helped to neutralize more than 600 potential terrorist attacks and has enabled the extradition of more than 500 suspected terrorists.

In economic terms, this is a reflection of a harsh reality in the region: threats in Central Asia and the Eurasian periphery are a regional phenomenon, and none of the states in the region stands alone in managing such threats, which includes extremism, narcotics trafficking, separatist violence, and more.

The SCO filled that gap as it had been clear that there are common interests in the stabilization of the region among the major powers despite their differences elsewhere.

Today, more than a quarter of the world’s population (42%) is living in SCO member states, which cover about a quarter of the global GDP. The organization works, and most importantly that is true on its anniversary.