Four documents were signed at the end of the session, the Russian government’s page on it says: the joint communiqué of the 25th meeting, a decision on the plan of measures for 2026-2030 to implement the programme of multilateral trade and economic cooperation, a decision on the concept of an SCO digital platform for international multimodal freight transport and a decision on the regulation of a data bank of investment projects in industry. The communiqué’s text was not among the files on the page by 07:35 Moscow time on Wednesday.
Kokhir Rasulzoda chaired, with Olzhas Bektenov, Abdulla Aripov, Mikhail Mishustin, Li Qiang and Belarus’s Alexander Turchin at the table, according to the list of delegation heads on the Russian government’s site. Pakistan sent deputy prime minister Ishaq Dar, Iran first vice-president Mohammad Reza Aref, India defence minister Rajnath Singh and Kyrgyzstan first deputy chairman Daniyar Amangeldiev, while Mongolia’s first deputy prime minister Jadambyn Enkhbayar came as an observer and Turkmenistan’s deputy chairman Hojamyrat Geldimyradov as an invited guest.
Mishustin put Russia’s trade with the organisation’s countries above 30 trillion roubles in 2025, up a further 18% in the first half of 2026, and pitched Russia’s special economic zones, with over 1,400 residents, and its investment-protection agreements, under which “more than 70 large projects are already being implemented”, to the other delegations. He closed by wishing success “to our Uzbek colleagues, to whom the chairmanship of the Council of Heads of Government passes”. Kazakhstan called on the SCO countries to work together on modernising sea and dry ports, Interfax reported.
Overchuk gave the session’s substance in a comment afterwards: deglobalisation, new supply chains, the transport backbone of Greater Eurasia and digital infrastructure for the movement of goods. “Countries today have already moved to mutual settlements in national currencies, so the meeting was to a greater degree about creating a new bank, the SCO bank,” Overchuk said. Delegations, he said, wished the bank to be “independent” and to settle in national currencies.
Kazakhstan called on the SCO countries to work together on modernising sea and dry ports, Interfax reported.
On shares and contributions it was “still too early to speak, because the principles of creating this organisation are still under discussion”, Overchuk said. He added that the rules should not discriminate against individual member states, and that the bank’s use of national currencies and the sources of its capital “all still have to be resolved”.
Emomali Rahmon had received the heads of delegation at the Palace of the Nation in the morning and spoken of the SCO’s economic development strategy to 2030, of the anti-drug centre the organisation is creating in Dushanbe and of Tajikistan’s UN initiative for an international decade of strengthening peace in 2027-2036, Asia-Plus and Kazinform reported. Mishustin and Li Qiang flew on to St Petersburg for the 31st regular meeting of the Russian and Chinese heads of government on Wednesday, with a joint communiqué and bilateral documents announced by the Russian government’s press service.