Official website of the President of Russia

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Vladimir Putin: Ladies and gentlemen!

I would like to express my satisfaction with the results of the summit we just had. The main result of our meeting has been the establishment of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation. I am convinced that the new association will make more rational and effective use of the potential of our countries. It will contribute to peace and stability in Central Asia. It is not accidental that the motto of the new organisation is security through cooperation. I wish to underscore that the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation is open to dialogue and cooperation with all countries and organisations concerned. Specific mechanisms of its activity will be defined in statutory documents to be signed next year.

Russia proposes to actively strengthen the new organisation. We aim above all to deepen our political, trade and economic cooperation and to expand our partnership in science and culture.

I would also like to say a few words about the principles underlying the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation.

You know that in the 1990s the Asia-Pacific and some other world areas were actively engaged in working out a concept of cooperative security. With globalisation spreading, it was seen as an alternative to military-political alliances. Underlying that concept was the interest of inter-connected states, above all neighbouring countries, in one another’s socio-economic successes and political stability.

Today this productive idea — to ensure one’s own and regional security through many-sided and multi-faceted cooperation — is taking on a new meaning. And the important thing here is recognition of the need for greater organisational neatness and legal formality of cooperation structures with the preservation of the consensus principle. We are sure that the example of good-neighbourliness and mutually beneficial partnership being demonstrated over the wide expanses between Europe and the Pacific by Shanghai Cooperation Organisation member-countries, will be positively perceived by the world community. By common decision of the Shanghai meeting participants, its main materials will be distributed as official UN documents.

Thank you.