EXPANDING FAMILY

As a steadfast champion of multilateralism since its founding, the SCO is committed to building an open and inclusive "big family" for like-minded countries.

At the Samarkand summit in 2022, the SCO kicked off a new round of the largest expansion of the SCO membership, signing a memorandum of obligations on Iran's SCO membership, starting the procedure for Belarus' accession, granting Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Qatar the status of SCO dialogue partners, and reaching an agreement on admitting Bahrain, the Maldives, the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait and Myanmar as new dialogue partners.

"In recent years, an increasing number of countries have applied to join our SCO family. This fully demonstrates the power of SCO's vision and the widely shared confidence in its future," Xi said on the significance of the SCO membership expansion.

From a regional organization with six founding members to a big family with dozens of members and partners, the SCO has developed into a new type of international organization, transcending differences in ideology, social system, and development path, and setting an example of international relations.

People-to-people exchanges constitute a crucial component of SCO cooperation. Cultural events such as the Year of Languages, the Year of Culture, and the Year of Tourism have been held in succession among member countries. The first Luban Workshop in Tajikistan in Central Asia has trained plenty of local professionals. Through flourishing cultural and people-to-people exchange events, the civil bond of the SCO family is getting stronger.

Over the years, China has worked to forge a series of consensus among SCO members on strengthening cooperation in big data, artificial intelligence, green infrastructure, tackling climate change, and safeguarding international energy and food security.

In the face of a torrent of global challenges and crises, the SCO has become an indispensable force in anchoring global stability, safeguarding world peace and security, and building a community with a shared future for mankind.

Looking into the future, China is ready to work with other SCO member states to actively implement the Global Development Initiative, the Global Security Initiative, and the Global Civilization Initiative, promote the development and prosperity of regional countries, build an even closer SCO community with a shared future, and jointly open up a brighter future for the Eurasian region.