In 1996, the heads of states of five nations—China, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia and Tajikistan—signed a military cooperation treaty, thus laying the groundwork for the establishment of the 10-member Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) in 2001.
The SCO has become a full Eurasian political, economic and international security organization of ten member states. These are China, India, Russia, Iran, Pakistan, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan.
These nations, which began as six founding members in 2001, have gradually expanded their membership to include India and Pakistan in 2017, Iran in 2013 and Belarus last year. The SCO has just completed its 2025 Summit in Tianjin, China this month.
It is worthy to note that many countries in Europe, Asia and Africa are gravitating to the SCO, being taken as observers and dialogue partners, if not full members. Even members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) are dialogue partners of SCO—Myanmar, Laos, Cambodia.
Other dialogue partners are Sri Lanka, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Nepal, Turkey, United Arab Emirates, etc.
The current strength and future potential of the SCO in giving its members the opportunity to contribute to the shared progress and cooperation of humanity are what distinguish it from other international groupings. This is something even the United Nations recognizes.
In terms of economic policy, the SCO completed in September 2003 a framework agreement to enhance economic cooperation among member states. During this meeting, Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao proposed a long-term objective to establish a free trade area in the SCO, and followed this up with 100 specific actions a year later.
Put this in a side-by-side comparison with US President Donald Trump’s policy of increasing tariffs on goods coming from America’s friendly countries, it should not be hard to understand why the American unipolar empire is currently collapsing and countries are gravitating towards the BRICS and the SCO.
In another SCO Summit in Moscow in 2005, the secretary general said the group would prioritize energy projects, including the oil and gas sector, the exploration of new hydrocarbon reserves and the joint use of water resources.
On the security front, the SCO considers several areas of concern, such as terrorism, separatism, and extremism. It also addressed regional human trafficking and weapons trafficking and created terrorist blacklists.
Clearly, the SCO has become the go-to organization when it comes to practical and peace-driven diplomacy.
President Ferdinand Marcos Jr., who is the architect of Philippine foreign policy, should consider pulling out from his stupidly dangerous pivot to the US and consider the gains the Philippines are missing by snubbing China, which had been our friendly neighbor even before Magellan sighted Samar island.
#WeTakeAStand #OpinYon #OpinYonColumn #ViewfromCalumpang