The Shanghai Cooperation Organisation’s 2022 summit will kick off today in Uzbekistan’s Samarkand. It will take place between September 15 and 16. 

This is the first time the summit is being held in-person since 2019’s version at the Bishkek summit in Kyrgyzstan

The SCO is an Eurasian political, economic and security organisation. By geographic scope, it is the largest regional organisation in the world.

Since 2016, 18 countries have been a part of the summit. Attendance at the meeting in Samarkand is divided into three categories: Member states, Observer states, and Dialogue partners.

Member states

The SCO is the successor to an organisation called the Shanghai Five, which was a security agreement formed in 1996 between Russia, China, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan and Tajikistan. 

Just five years later, the Shanghai Five morphed into the SCO with the addition of Uzbekistan. 

Both Indian and Pakistan were invited to attend the SCO summit from 2005 onwards, although Mongolia received an invite a year prior, in 2004. At the time, the rival countries were invited as observers, but both countries received full membership status in 2017. 

Observer states

Since India and Pakistan were made member state at the SCO, there are only four countries that act as observers at the summit. 

The most recent country to receive observer status was Belarus. Initially, the country was seen as an exclusively European country but nonetheless, in received its dialogue partner status in 2010. Two years later in 2012, the country applied for observer status, which it received in 2015. 

Mongolia became the first country to receive observer status in 2004, which was followed shortly by India and Pakistan. 

Iran received their observer status alongside India and Pakistan in 2005. In September 2021, all eight member states of the SCO  gave their consent to begin procedures to convert Iran’s observer status to a membership status.  The country had first applied to be a full member back in 2008. At the time, Russian diplomat had mentioned that the procedure would take a “fair amount of time”, the Financial Tribune reported. 

Afghanistan joined the the SCO in 2012 after receiving observer status at that year’s summit in Beijing, China. However, since the removal of the Afghan government and the takeover by the Taliban, no country has given the organisation diplomatic recognition. The Taliban has also not sent any representatives to participate in any SCO meetings since last year. 

Dialogue partners

The SCO created the dialogue partner status in 2008. The first country to receive the status was Sri Lanka. The island country had their application approved in 2009 and was granted dialogue partner status in 2010.

Two years later, in 2012, Turkey had their application approved. They were granted the status in 2013. 

The 2015 summit held in Ufa, Russia saw the applications of four countries being approved, namely: Cambodia, Azerbaijan, Nepal and Armenia. All of them received their dialogue partner status in 2016. 

Egypt, Qatar and Saudi Arabia had applied to the SCO, with their applications being approved last year, but their dialogue status has yet to be announced. It might happen at the summit in Samarkand today or tomorrow.