The SCO is not a military bloc nor is it aimed at any one country or group, said officials here, underlining that this week’s Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) Summit that will bring together 15 regional “strongmen” leaders, including Russian President Vladimir Putin, Chinese President Xi Jinping, Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Prime Minister Narendra Modi to Samarkand on Thursday. This will be the first such summit with Mr. Putin since the invasion in Ukraine, which has sparked sanctions by the U.S.-EU and their partners, and the first time Mr. Xi is stepping out for a multilateral conference since the COVID pandemic.
Both Russia and China came in for severe criticism on different issues at the G-7 Summit in June this year, and the optics of the SCO this year will be that of a counter to the western coalition: as all countries particularly targeted by the West — Russia, Iran, China, Belarus and Turkey — find common cause. In an opinion piece, the U.K.’s Sunday Times even dubbed the meet an “anti-West ‘dictators’ club’.”
When asked if India, as the next Chair of the SCO, which will host the summit in 2023, was worried by the label, India’s Ambassador to Uzbekistan Manish Prabhat said the perception was unfounded.
