| Background to the 2026 SCO Summit in Bishkek

On September 1, 2026, the 26th Meeting of the Council of Heads of State of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) Member States and the "SCO Plus" Meeting were held in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan. Kyrgyz President Sadyr Japarov, whose country chaired the SCO from 2025 to 2026, presided, and the heads of state or government of the ten member states attended. The chairmanship then passed to Pakistan, which is scheduled to host the next Council of Heads of State meeting in 2027.¹⁾ Marking the SCO's 25th anniversary, the summit underscored the challenge of translating the effects of membership expansion into organizational operations and policy implementation. The SCO was launched in 2001 as a six-member organization of China, Russia, and four Central Asian states. India and Pakistan joined in 2017, Iran in 2023, and Belarus in 2024, bringing membership to ten. Expansion has given the SCO broader geopolitical representation, but it has also brought the China-India rivalry, the India-Pakistan conflict, and differing positions on relations with the West and on sanctions into the organization. As a result, it is now important not only to set a common agenda but also to secure the institutional arrangements and funding needed to implement agreements.

The Bishkek meeting needs to be understood as a step in implementing the SCO Development Strategy until 2035, adopted at the 2025 summit in Tianjin, China. The strategy lays out the medium- to long-term direction of cooperation from 2026 to 2035: political trust; security; economy, transport, and energy; digital transformation; and people-to-people exchanges. Notably, the Bishkek meeting approved a protocol amending the SCO Charter and organizational regulations governing specialized bodies, among other documents. These measures are meant to strengthen the organization institutionally, but whether they actually improve its capacity to execute decisions has to be judged through their subsequent implementation. The backdrop to the meeting also includes the protracted war in Ukraine, instability in the Middle East, supply chain realignment, and competition over technology norms. Many member states want to expand the means of cooperation for responding to external shocks, but their threat perceptions and economic interests do not necessarily align. The summit's outcomes should therefore be examined in three categories: matters finalized in documents, issues still under discussion, and projects proposed by individual member states.²⁾

| Key Agreements and Plans from the 2026 SCO Summit in Bishkek

Charter Amendments and Operational Groundwork for Security Cooperation Bodies

The summit approved a total of 28 documents, including the Bishkek Declaration, the Protocol on Amendments and Additions to the SCO Charter, and a joint statement on assistance to states affected by emergencies. It also approved the organizational regulations of the Universal Center for Countering Challenges and Threats to the Security of SCO Member States and of the Executive Committee of the SCO Anti-Drug Center, and the plans for the Universal Center include setting up an Information Security Center and a Center for Combating Transnational Organized Crime. Approval of the regulations lays the legal and organizational groundwork for these bodies, but it should be distinguished from permanent bodies actually operating with sufficient staff and budgets. The Declaration also states explicitly that it expects these bodies to begin substantive operations soon. The Charter amendment likewise should be assessed by distinguishing the approval and signing of the protocol from its entry into force and actual application under follow-up procedures. The points to check going forward are whether staff are recruited, budgets are allocated, and information-sharing procedures are in place, and whether joint response activities and performance reporting take place.

The SCO is seeking to broaden its areas of expertise from cooperation centered on the Regional Anti-Terrorist Structure (RATS) to drugs, transnational crime, information security, and other areas. This shift is an attempt to turn political declarations into working-level cooperation in specific fields. Whether adding more bodies actually resolves overlap with existing institutions and constraints on information sharing among member states, however, needs to be checked separately. In external cooperation, the approval of a roadmap for cooperation among the SCO, the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO), and the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) and the holding of the first trilateral event were confirmed. The SCO's acquisition of observer status at the CIS and its exchanges with the Eurasian Economic Commission (EEC), the UN Environment Programme (UNEP), and the Arab League were also presented. The decision to sign a memorandum of understanding with the African Union Commission is a follow-up step toward wider cooperation and widens the channels for institutional cooperation. This points to the possibility that the new Eurasian order will develop not into an order run by a single integrated multilateral organization but into a "networked institutional order," in which multilateral bodies such as the SCO, CSTO, CIS, and the Eurasian Economic Union (EAEU) are linked by function.³⁾

The Expanding Security Agenda and Positions on Regional Issues

While reaffirming its commitment to countering terrorism, separatism, and extremism, the Bishkek Declaration also covered drugs, transnational organized crime, information security, artificial intelligence (AI), nuclear nonproliferation, biosecurity, and disaster response. In particular, it stressed the safe and responsible use of AI and opposed uses that harm human life and health or the sovereignty, security, and territorial integrity of states. It also underscored the importance of signing a memorandum of understanding on AI cooperation, indicating that AI is being discussed as a matter of information, security, and national sovereignty alongside industrial development.⁴⁾

However, the broadening of the SCO's cooperation agenda does not mean a shift toward a collective defense alliance like NATO. The SCO has no NATO-style collective defense clause or integrated military command structure, and it pursues cooperation on the basis of its members' sovereignty and consensus. The difference between the two organizations should be found in collective defense obligations and how binding their institutional commitments are rather than in the existence of various disagreements among members. In other words, it is appropriate to understand the SCO's security cooperation as centered on counterterrorism exercises, information exchange, and cooperation and coordination among competent authorities. The Middle East and Afghanistan were also addressed as major issues. Member states expressed support for Iran's sovereignty and territorial integrity and emphasized resolving the conflict through political and diplomatic means. They also reaffirmed the position that a comprehensive and just resolution of the Palestinian issue is a prerequisite for peace and stability in the Middle East. On Afghanistan, they supported the goal of Afghanistan becoming an independent, neutral, and peaceful country free from terrorism and drugs and pointed to the need for an inclusive government. This is an approach that links Central Asia's stability to conflicts and cross-border threats in surrounding regions.⁵⁾

Meanwhile, the implications for the Korean Peninsula are more limited. The Bishkek Declaration stresses the nonproliferation principles of member states that are parties to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) and the peaceful settlement of disputes between states, but it makes no direct mention of North Korea or the Korean Peninsula issue. These principles therefore cannot be read as a separate agreement among SCO members on the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula. For South Korea, they offer an indirect basis for communication on the need for nuclear nonproliferation and for easing tensions on the Peninsula, but this should be clearly distinguished from superseding the Korean Peninsula policies of individual countries, including China and Russia, or the existing negotiating frameworks.

Consultations on Establishing the SCO Development Bank and Financial Cooperation

At the 2026 SCO summit in Bishkek, economic cooperation was presented as a major agenda item alongside security. In the economic sphere in particular, member states reaffirmed their commitment to implementing the SCO Economic Development Strategy until 2030 and to cooperation on trade expansion, supply chain stability, e-commerce, smart customs, and energy. In finance, discussions continued on expanding the share of local currency settlements and on establishing the SCO Development Bank. The bank, however, is not an operating financial institution but an initiative still in the consultation stage. Interested member states reached a political consensus on establishing the SCO Development Bank at the 2025 Tianjin summit. At the third consultation meeting, held in Bishkek on May 28, 2026, participants then discussed the key elements of the bank. The May 29 meeting of finance ministers and central bank governors also received a report on progress in the consultations. The declaration of the September summit assesses the progress made by the relevant member states and stresses the importance of continued efforts, but it is somewhat premature to present this as an achievement in launching the bank or extending loans.⁶⁾

For an actual launch, participating countries, capital contributions, voting rights and governance, funding arrangements, and project appraisal procedures would have to be worked out, and the bank's role relative to existing institutions such as the New Development Bank (NDB), the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB), and the Eurasian Development Bank also needs to be reviewed. Once launched, the bank could finance joint projects in transport, energy, and digital fields, but that potential and its actual financing results are separate matters for assessment. Capital contributions, voting rights, and the coordination of roles with these existing institutions, however, are issues that must be resolved.⁷⁾ Likewise, the SCO Development Bank's expansion of local currency settlement requires distinguishing the direction of cooperation from actual results. Reaffirming the intent to implement the local currency settlement roadmap does not by itself establish that the settlement share has risen, so settlement volumes by major currency, currency conversion costs, access to payment networks, and actual use by firms need to be checked.⁸⁾

Logistics and Energy Connectivity and China's Advanced Technology Cooperation Initiatives

The 2026 SCO summit in Bishkek reaffirmed the importance of cooperation on international railways and roads, multimodal transport corridors, logistics centers, and digital customs clearance. Since the war in Ukraine, sanctions, insurance, and transport risks on routes running directly through Russia have continued to rise, and Eurasian transport networks are being built, such as the Middle Corridor (Trans-Caspian International Transport Route), which crosses the Caspian Sea, the International North-South Transport Corridor (INSTC), and the China-Kyrgyzstan-Uzbekistan railway. Chinese President Xi Jinping also voiced support in his speech for improving the efficiency of the Trans-Caspian corridor. However, the Middle Corridor, the INSTC, and the China-Kyrgyzstan-Uzbekistan railway are projects with different participating countries and implementation frameworks, so the fact that the summit stressed connectivity cooperation should be distinguished from the construction and operation of individual corridors. The Middle Corridor is a route that bypasses Russia, running from Central Asia through the Caspian Sea and the South Caucasus to Europe. The INSTC, by contrast, consists of multiple routes linking India, Iran, Russia, and other countries. The China-Kyrgyzstan-Uzbekistan railway is likewise being pursued under its own consultations among participating countries and project framework. To judge the economic viability and risks of each project, transit countries, transshipment points, customs clearance conditions, financing, and transport performance each need to be examined separately. The SCO is not directly implementing or managing all of these projects in an integrated manner but is seeking cooperation on an individual basis.

Meanwhile, Xi announced that China would develop an international AI application cooperation center for SCO countries, jointly pursue 100 science and technology cooperation projects over the next three years, and establish a China-SCO port economic cooperation center in Tianjin.⁹⁾ China is also presenting a medium- to long-term goal of expanding beyond cooperation on energy, logistics, and transport infrastructure to AI, advanced technology industries, and port networks.¹⁰⁾ In other words, China is expanding the establishment and operation of the AI application cooperation center, participating countries and budgets by project, and actual budgetary support, and thereby seeks to use the SCO as a priority area for cooperation under the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) and the Global Development Initiative (GDI).

These initiatives can be linked to member states' needs for industrialization and digital transformation. However, the countries that supported aligning the BRI with the EAEU in the Bishkek Declaration were Belarus, Iran, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Pakistan, Russia, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan, and India was not on that list. This indicates that even within a joint document, the extent of participation in and support for individual initiatives can differ. In advanced technology cooperation as well, dependence on funding and technology and the compatibility of data management and standards could become issues going forward. In the end, this shows that the SCO is not a single integrated China-led economic and technological bloc but a form of variable-geometry cooperation, in which all member states participate at different levels by sector.¹¹⁾

| Strategic Implications of the 2026 SCO Summit in Bishkek

Organizational Implementation Capacity and Eurasian Institutional Connectivity

The 2026 SCO summit in Bishkek marked the beginning of a shift from membership expansion to strengthening the substance of organizational operations. Starting with the accession of India and Pakistan in 2017, the SCO grew to a ten-member organization by 2024. It emphasized its representativeness and geopolitical importance, but it also faced greater difficulty in reaching internal consensus. In particular, the summit broadened the scope of cooperation while improving the organization and procedures needed to carry it out. Its focus was on turning the enlarged organization into a substantively institutionalized one through Charter amendments, the establishment of specialized centers, economic and financial cooperation, and links with multilateral forums.

Accordingly, the key to evaluation lies less in the number of documents than in the extent to which agreements translate into budgets and projects. For example, the operation of specialized bodies, consultations on establishing the SCO Development Bank, and progress on local currency settlement and technology cooperation may move at different speeds, so the costs of turning political and economic agreements into actual implementation capacity and member states' willingness to participate need to be examined together. This means that the standard for assessing the SCO's real results and influence is shifting from "how many member states take part" to "what projects it carries out and what real results it achieves." Whether the medium- to long-term goals of the SCO Development Strategy until 2035 are being turned into actual institutions, budgets, and projects is therefore likely to bear directly on the SCO's continued development.

Meanwhile, the SCO is establishing itself as a new Eurasian multilateral forum for economic and security cooperation. Beyond counterterrorism and border-area stability, it has been gradually expanding its fields of cooperation to railways, roads, ports, energy, supply chains, finance, and trade. In particular, cooperation among the SCO, CSTO, and CIS and the alignment of the EAEU and the BRI show different institutions and projects overlapping in Eurasia. The membership, purposes, and mandates of these organizations do not coincide, so expanded contact among institutions can increase the channels for cooperation but does not mean the completion of a more integrated Eurasian economic and security sphere. In other words, unlike in the Cold War era, the restructuring toward a new Eurasian order does not mean a single sphere of influence in which one particular country leads and controls everything; it means the arrival of a complex new kind of network that widens strategic options. Ultimately, what matters for South Korea is what changes this SCO-led connectivity brings to logistics costs, customs procedures, supply chains, and advanced technology norms. For example, whether smart customs cooperation shortens logistics transit times, whether the application of specific advanced technology standards changes business conditions for South Korean companies, and whether participation requirements for development finance open to outside companies need to be checked, which calls for a new approach.

China-Russia Agenda-Setting and Member States' Strategic Autonomy

China and Russia are the core countries that have led the SCO's founding and development, and they share an understanding of easing the monopoly of the US and Western-centered order and expanding strategic autonomy in Eurasia. Since the war in Ukraine, the two countries have strengthened cooperation in politics, the economy, energy, and finance, and at the 2026 China-Russia summit as well they reaffirmed the strengthening of strategic cooperation in multilateral venues such as the UN, BRICS, and the SCO.¹²⁾ At the 2026 SCO Plus meeting in Bishkek, Xi stressed in his public remarks the strengthening of the UN's role and the restructuring of the international order toward multipolarity, and he also stated the need for more just and equitable global governance reform in order to realize a more equal and orderly multipolar world. This shows that the SCO, led by China and Russia, is expanding its scope beyond an existing Eurasian cooperation organization into a new multilateral organization that calls for restructuring the international order. In other words, China connects its Global Development, Security, Civilization, and Governance Initiatives to the SCO's main cooperation agenda, and Russia attaches importance to links between Eurasian security and multilateral regional organizations, so the SCO is being used as an important vehicle for spreading these comprehensive initiatives as multilateral agendas.¹³⁾

However, the influence of China and Russia does not make the policies of all member states identical. India takes a somewhat different position on the BRI while also maintaining cooperation with the United States, Japan, and Australia. Central Asian countries also draw on Chinese investment and Russia's security role while broadening cooperation with South Korea, Europe, Turkey, Japan, and others. These differences are also a constraint on the SCO. Consensus-based decision-making protects member states' sovereignty but can make joint action difficult on sensitive issues. The China-India and India-Pakistan conflicts, financial constraints from sanctions on Russia and Iran, and the issues of capital and voting rights at the SCO Development Bank also affect the pace of implementation. If China's share of funding and technology grows, other member states will try to balance the benefits of cooperation against the costs of dependence. Accordingly, rather than reading the SCO's expansion as the consolidation of a single anti-Western bloc, it is necessary to look at differences in agreement and participation issue by issue.

Therefore, despite the SCO's growing influence, structural constraints remain an important obstacle. First, the SCO's consensus-based decision-making protects member states' sovereignty and autonomy but makes joint action and common positions difficult on sensitive issues or conflicts. Second, the Iran issue and the conflicts among India, China, and Pakistan limit the cohesion of security and economic cooperation. Third, reconciling differences of interest among members over the SCO Development Bank's funding and governance is important. Fourth, sanctions on Russia and Iran are increasing the difficulty of carrying out financial and investment projects. Fifth, if China's economic weight and influence expand rapidly, concerns about a weakening of strategic autonomy could arise among other member states. Ultimately, the indicators to watch over the next five years are (1) whether the SCO Development Bank is actually launched and its capital structure; (2) smooth cargo transport on the China-Kyrgyzstan-Uzbekistan railway; (3) whether SCO-CSTO-CIS cooperation produces substantive results; (4) the practical functioning of the centers for countering security challenges and threats; (5) the operation of the AI and digital cooperation centers and the implementation of about 100 science and technology projects; (6) de-dollarization and the share of local currency settlement; and (7) the agenda of the 2027 summit under Pakistan's chairmanship. Whether these indicators are met will indicate whether the SCO can move beyond mere political, diplomatic, and economic discourse and establish itself as a substantive Eurasian multilateral cooperation organization.

Similarities and Differences between the SCO and BRICS in the Competition over Global Governance

The governance reform initiatives that China and Russia have recently put forward through the SCO overlap with key BRICS agenda items. Both forums emphasize multilateralism and sovereignty and seek to expand the representation and voice of emerging and developing countries in international organizations. UN-centered cooperation, reform of international economic and financial governance, and the governance of AI and other emerging technologies are also shared agenda items. By taking part in both venues, China and Russia seek to connect their own initiatives with member states' demand for cooperation.

Of course, the two forums differ in their institutional character and in the origins of their cooperation. The SCO evolved from cooperation on border stability and counterterrorism in Eurasia and is a regional organization with a charter, a secretariat, and permanent security bodies. BRICS, by contrast, is a political and economic coordination forum that connects emerging and developing countries across several continents, and it covers a relatively broad geographic scope in global governance and development finance. Although BRICS retains its character as an informal grouping, it has established and operates a separate international financial institution, the NDB. In particular, it is important to distinguish the levels of implementation in development finance. Launched in 2015, the NDB supports infrastructure and sustainable development projects, whereas the SCO Development Bank is at the stage of working toward its establishment. The NDB's membership also does not fully overlap with that of BRICS. The financial cooperation of the two organizations can hardly be evaluated as achievements at the same stage, nor can discussions on the use of local currencies be described as the completion of a common currency and an integrated payment system. Ultimately, regional security and connectivity carry relatively greater weight in the SCO, and global representation and development finance carry relatively greater weight in BRICS. Rather than treating the two forums as the same bloc under the unilateral control of China and Russia, it is therefore necessary to examine separately the norms each puts forward and the conditions for participation in projects.¹⁴⁾

| The Emergence of a New Eurasian Order and South Korea's Strategic Response

The Emergence of Norms and Institutions for a New Eurasian Order

In the wake of the prolonged war in Ukraine, intensifying US-China strategic competition, and the Iran conflict, non-Western multilateral cooperation networks, including the Global South and the SCO, have gained considerable prominence, with China and Russia as a new axis. China has already advanced the GDI, the Global Security Initiative (GSI), and the Global Civilization Initiative (GCI), followed in 2025 by a concept paper on the Global Governance Initiative (GGI), and it emphasizes a discourse on a fairer and more reasonable international order. The discourse on a multipolar international order that China and Russia have stressed has been strongly welcomed and supported by Global South countries, so structural change in the international order is likely to lead to substantive policy rather than remain mere political and diplomatic discourse. In particular, the SCO has repeatedly raised the importance of an equal and indivisible Eurasian security architecture through the 2024 Astana Declaration, the 2025 Tianjin "SCO Development Strategy until 2035," and the 2026 Bishkek summit. China and Russia are expanding the norms and institutional foundations of a new international order that spans Eurasia, going beyond mere bilateral cooperation.

The strengthening of China-Russia strategic cooperation and of the SCO's institutions can be interpreted as a sign of the diversification of the international order and the expansion of Eurasian countries' options. However, this cannot be taken directly as the end of the US- and Western-centered order or the completion of a China-Russia-led multipolar order. The United States and Western countries still maintain structural superiority in military, financial, and technological terms, while China and Russia seek to expand their influence in Eurasia through various multilateral forums. In other words, the SCO should be seen neither simply as a sphere of unilateral influence of China and Russia nor as an organization operating independently of their influence. It needs to be understood as a Eurasian multilateral forum in which China's and Russia's agenda-setting capacity coexists with member states' strategic autonomy. As such, the most important feature of the 2026 SCO summit in Bishkek is the shift from broadening its reach to deepening its institutions. On its 25th anniversary, the SCO amended and supplemented its Charter, strengthened permanent bodies for responding to nontraditional security threats, and gave more concrete form to practical cooperation agendas such as the SCO Development Bank, local currency settlement, smart customs, AI, transport and infrastructure, and energy. At the same time, by actively raising the role of the UN, a multipolar international order, and global governance reform through SCO Plus, it also greatly expanded its political, economic, and security reach. However, one should avoid concluding that these changes amount to the emergence of an anti-Western bloc led by China and Russia. In particular, the SCO officially emphasizes its non-aligned, non-bloc character, and India's and the Central Asian states' diversified diplomacy, consensus-based operation, the issue of funding for the SCO Development Bank, and complex economic and security conflicts among members limit the organization's cohesion. Accordingly, the changes shown by the 2026 SCO summit in Bishkek do not represent the replacement of the existing US- and Western-centered order by the SCO. Rather, they point to an increase in the institutional, economic, and diplomatic options that Eurasian countries can selectively access and use, and to growing potential for links among multilateral forums such as BRICS, regional organizations such as the EAEU and the CSTO, and cooperation initiatives such as the BRI.

South Korea's Strategic Response

South Korea's response should be directly or indirectly linked to the institutional, financial, logistical, and technological changes confirmed at the SCO summit. The key task is to monitor the SCO's implementation, select areas for cooperation with individual member states, and review project conditions and risks together. Rather than expanding this into a new design for South Korea's Eurasia strategy, it should be approached as a task of supplementing the implementation capacity of existing diplomatic and economic cooperation frameworks. In particular, South Korea has cooperation channels that it leads, including the Korea-Central Asia Cooperation Forum and its Secretariat, the Korea-Central Asia Business Council, and the Korea-Central Asia Think Tank Forum. The Cooperation Forum, launched in 2007, has broadened its cooperative basis through the opening of a secretariat in 2017, the launch of the Business Council in 2020, and the inauguration of the Think Tank Forum in 2024, and the Senior Officials' Meeting and consultations among relevant ministries were also used in preparing for the 2026 Korea-Central Asia Summit. Therefore, rather than creating a separate standing consultative body on the SCO and Eurasian strategy, it is reasonable to supplement existing channels with a monitoring function. For example, the function to be added is to distinguish among the SCO summit's political declarations, legal and organizational decisions, and projects backed by a certain level of funding, and to convey them to relevant ministries and companies.¹⁵⁾

Going forward, South Korea needs to approach Eurasian cooperation with SCO countries as a logistics-resources-digital package rather than as individual projects. First, it should combine smart logistics and digital customs technology with the Middle Corridor, Caspian Sea ports, and Central Asian rail networks. Second, it should develop critical minerals cooperation not as simple purchases of raw materials but as supply chain cooperation linking exploration, processing, refining, materials and components, and recycling. Third, in e-government, cybersecurity, and AI workforce development, it can draw on South Korea's distinctive strengths to present a cooperation model differentiated from the China-centered digital ecosystem. To this end, South Korea must comprehensively review the SCO's open agenda areas such as transport, digital, environment, and disasters together with member states' national development strategies. In other words, smart customs, e-commerce, port economy, minerals, and AI cooperation promoted by the SCO may offer South Korea potential business opportunities, but sophisticated risk management that reviews in advance the somewhat complex and sensitive financial and technology projects that could be linked to Russia, China, and Iran is essential. Moreover, South Korea must not approach its relationship with the SCO through the dichotomy of "join or exclude." It needs to calibrate its level of engagement incrementally while examining the possibilities and risks of cooperation by sector. In the short term, it should build a foundation for policy dialogue with member states, surveys of project demand, and workforce development cooperation, and in the medium to long term, it should pursue pilot projects in logistics, critical minerals, digital, and AI. Participation in events such as SCO Plus should be considered while confirming the chair's invitation and the specific conditions for participation. This selective engagement should not run counter to ROK-US relations: it should widen South Korea's diplomatic room for maneuver. As great power competition among the United States, China, and Russia intensifies, the challenge for South Korean diplomacy is not simply to choose one side but to manage complex risks and expand its strategic space. In other words, South Korea needs a K-Eurasia strategy that keeps ROK-US relations stable, manages relations with China and Russia so that they do not turn into full-scale confrontation, and secures space for national interests in Eurasia.

Meanwhile, as part of the South Korea-led K-Eurasia strategy, first, South Korea needs to form a consultative body, tentatively named the SCO-Eurasia Strategy Consultative Body, with the participation of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, relevant ministries, and government-funded research institutes to comprehensively analyze summit documents, the development bank, sanctions, logistics corridors, and technology norms. Second, as a follow-up to the Korea-Central Asia Summit, it should establish standing working groups on critical minerals, logistics, digital, AI, and health and devise financing support plans for each project. Third, it should pursue Track 1.5 or Track 2 dialogues that link SCO Plus participation and member states' research institutes, in order to explain South Korea's Eurasia strategy directly and expand cooperation networks. Fourth, to enable corporate participation, it needs to build a tentatively named K-Eurasia Cooperation Risk Matrix that integrates country-specific sanctions, exchange rate, logistics, and political and security risks, and to establish a tailored financial support system in which the Export-Import Bank of Korea, the Korea Trade Insurance Corporation, and private financial institutions jointly participate. Fifth, South Korea's K-Eurasia strategy should manage ROK-US relations, crisis management with China and Russia, Eurasian cooperation, and the Korean Peninsula issue within a single integrated strategic structure rather than treating them separately. This is not a diplomacy of mechanical equidistance; it should be approached as multifaceted strategic management that manages security risks and widens economic and diplomatic options.

Moreover, the SCO's principle of openness in cooperation leaves room to consider dialogue with non-member countries. South Korea can draw on member states' research institutes and existing think tank networks to pursue policy dialogue on customs and digital cooperation and on regional security. In particular, on the Korean Peninsula issue, it can use the principles of nuclear nonproliferation and the peaceful settlement of disputes set out at the summit in policy communication with member states.¹⁶⁾ However, because North Korea is not a full SCO member and the declaration contains no agreement on the Korean Peninsula, the focus should be not on achieving denuclearization through the SCO as a policy goal but on communicating with individual members such as China and Russia about easing tensions, preventing miscalculation, and nuclear nonproliferation and on explaining South Korea's position. Ultimately, South Korea's strategic response, too, should focus less on the question of "whether to join or oppose the SCO" than on how to increase South Korea's options within the new Eurasian regional order. A multilayered strategy is needed that maintains the reliability of ROK-US and ROK-Japan relations and extended deterrence while expanding economic, resource, logistics, and technology cooperation with the Eurasian region, keeping crisis management channels with China and Russia, and engaging selectively with the SCO's open agenda. Whether the SCO will establish itself as a core organization in restructuring the new Eurasian order should be approached objectively through the substantive results of the SCO Development Bank, logistics corridors, digital and AI cooperation, and crisis response and security centers. It is desirable for South Korea to view these changes from a medium- to long-term perspective, respect the strategic autonomy of Eurasian countries, and at the same time recognize Eurasia and the Pacific not as mutually competing, exclusive spaces but as a new, interconnected strategic space, and to approach them with a focus on substantive national interests.

1. The 26th Meeting of the Council of Heads of State of the SCO Member States and the "SCO Plus" Meeting was held in Bishkek on September 1, 2026. The motto of the Kyrgyz chairmanship was "25 Years of the SCO: Together for Sustainable Peace, Development and Prosperity," and the chairmanship for 2027 was handed over to Pakistan. Shanghai Cooperation Organisation, "The 26th Meeting of the Council of Heads of State of the SCO Member States and the 'SCO Plus' Meeting Held in Kyrgyzstan," (1 September 2026); "Bishkek Declaration on the 25th Anniversary of the SCO," (1 September 2026); “上海合作組織(SCO)二十五周年比什凯克宣言,” 『新華社』 2026年9月1日.
2. The "SCO Development Strategy until 2035" corresponds to the formal title "SCO Development Strategy for the Next 10 Years (2026-2035)." Shanghai Cooperation Organization (上海合作組織), "Bishkek Declaration on the 25th Anniversary of the SCO" (上海合作組織二十五周年比什凯克宣言), preamble and section 5. The Bishkek Declaration reaffirms the implementation of the goals of that strategy.
3. The SCO-CSTO-CIS cooperation initiative shows that the Eurasian order is developing not through integration into a single organization but into a networked structure in which different multilateral organizations are linked by function. The SCO has already obtained observer status at the CIS and has been expanding cooperation with the EEC, UNEP, the Arab League, and others.
4. The Bishkek Declaration states the need for the safe and responsible use of AI, for preventing AI uses that deliberately harm human life and health and national security and sovereignty, and for AI cooperation among member state governments. This shows that AI is recognized not only as a matter of industrial policy but also, at the same time, as one of information security and national sovereignty. “上海合作組織(SCO)二十五周年比什凯克宣言,” 『新華社』 2026年9月1日.
5. Unlike NATO, the SCO has neither a collective defense clause that triggers automatic intervention nor an integrated military command structure, and it makes decisions on the basis of consensus among member states. In other words, it is appropriate to understand SCO military and security cooperation as a consultative arrangement centered on counterterrorism and nontraditional security, military exercises, and information exchange, rather than as a collective defense alliance like NATO.
6. A political consensus on establishing the SCO Development Bank was reached among interested member states at the 2025 Tianjin summit, and at the third consultation meeting in Bishkek on May 28, 2026, delegates from 20 countries discussed its key design elements. SCO Secretariat, "The Third Consultation Meeting on Shanghai Cooperation Organization Development Bank held in Bishkek," (29 May 2026).
7. The Meeting of Finance Ministers and Central Bank Governors of SCO member states, held in Bishkek on May 29, 2026, discussed not only the establishment of the SCO Development Bank but also uncertainty in the global financial order, the digitalization of public finances, expanded use of national currencies in mutual settlements among member states, and working-level cooperation among financial authorities. SCO Secretariat, "SCO Member States' Finance Ministers and Central (National) Bank Governors Meet in Bishkek," (29 May 2026). (https://eng.sectsco.org/20260529/2335857.html accessed September 3, 2026)
8. Even if the use of local currencies through the SCO Development Bank increases, constraints such as exchange rate fluctuations and limited access to financial institutions may remain, so this should not be fully equated with the replacement of the dollar-centered financial order. Member states are expanding trade among themselves through new payment methods.
9. 習近平, 「推動上海合作組織實現更高質量發展——在上海合作組織成員國元首理事會第二十六次會議上的講話」, 中國外交部, 2026.9.1, https://www.mfa.gov.cn/web/zyxw/202609/t20260901_12013951.shtml. (accessed September 23, 2026). The first proposal in the speech presents an international AI application cooperation center, 100 science and technology cooperation projects over three years, and a port economic cooperation center in Tianjin, among others, in the form of plans.
10. China plans to pursue a variety of economic and technology cooperation projects by linking the SCO with the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) and the Global Development Initiative (GDI), including through the establishment of an international artificial intelligence (AI) application cooperation center and a China-SCO port economic cooperation center (中國-上海合作組織口岸經濟合作中心). “習近平在上海合作組織成員國元首理事會第二十六次會議上的重要講話,” 『中國外交部』 2026年9月1日.
11. China-led expansion of advanced digital and AI cooperation is a new growth engine for many SCO member states, but it also carries the possibility of competition over technology norms led by the United States and the West and of the division of supply chains into blocs. “上合組織成員國元首簽署《比什凯克宣言》,” 『SPUTNIK』 2026年9月1日.
12. The May 2026 China-Russia summit showed a trend toward institutionalizing cooperation in the political, economic, energy, and technology fields through a joint statement and the signing of numerous cooperation documents. However, differences also remain over energy prices, the level of military support for Russia, and influence in the Global South. 정재흥, 「미중·중러 정상회담 이후 국제질서 변화와 한국의 전략적 대응」, 『세종포커스』 (2026.6.8), pp. 4-8.
13. At the 2026 SCO meeting in Bishkek, Xi Jinping called for strengthening the role of the UN, restructuring toward a more equal and orderly multipolar international order, and fair global governance reform. In other words, the SCO is being expanded from an existing Eurasian multilateral cooperation organization into a new platform for discussing reform of the international order. 習近平, “共同倡導平等有序的世界多極化實現更加公正合理的全球治理,” 『新華社』 2026年9月1日.
14. BRICS Brasil, "About the BRICS," 2025년 의장국 공식 소개, https://brics.br/en/about-the-brics (검색일 2026년 9월 27일); New Development Bank, "About NDB," https://www.ndb.int/about-ndb/; "Members," https://www.ndb.int/about-ndb/members/. (accessed September 29, 2026). The NDB is a separate multilateral development bank launched in 2015 that supports infrastructure and sustainable development, and members other than its founding members also participate.
15. 「2026년 제1차 한·중앙아시아 정상회의 제1차 고위관리회의 개최」, https://www.mofa.go.kr/www/brd/m_4080/view.do?seq=377102 (accessed October 2, 2026). The composition of the existing cooperation channels and the consultations to prepare for the summit can be confirmed from this source, and the functional supplementation of the cooperation framework and the common project review table are policy proposals to build on this foundation.
16. Rather than presupposing a direct resolution of the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula through the SCO, South Korea needs to consider a direct and indirect approach that uses policy dialogue with China, Russia, and the Eurasian member states to broaden the basis for crisis management and communication.

※ The opinions expressed in 'Sejong Focus' are those of the author and do not represent the official views of Sejong Institute.