Maham Tahir

The 25th Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) Summit in Tianjin (31 Aug–1 Sept 2025) concluded with leaders signing the Tianjin Declaration, adopting a Development Strategy to 2035, and approving 24 outcome documents spanning security, economy and people-to-people ties.

China’s Foreign Ministry said leaders also issued a statement on the multilateral trading system.
Pakistan formally participated at heads-of-state level, with Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif leading the delegation, according to the Foreign Office’s curtain-raiser and post-summit note.

At the summit, President Xi Jinping announced China would create three major platforms with SCO partners in energy, green industry, and the digital economy, alongside three cooperation centres for scientific and technological innovation, higher education, and vocational/technical education.

Xinhua’s summit wrap noted the leaders signed/adopted the Tianjin Declaration and longer-term economic strategy, underscoring a widened agenda into development and digital domains.

On the bloc’s weight, Xinhua reported ahead of the summit that the SCO now represents “nearly half of the world’s population” and “about a quarter of global GDP.”

Xinhua coverage and China’s MFA readouts emphasised expanded cooperation on digital economy and e-commerce, with action plans to promote paperless trade and digital connectivity among members as part of the 24 outcome documents.

While summit documents/public briefings referenced new cooperation platforms and centres, Chinese and state-media readouts also described discussions on economic/financial mechanisms to support green and digital projects across the SCO (e.g., cooperation platforms, action plans).

Pakistan: opportunities and caveats Pakistan’s presence was two-track: foreign ministers’ meetings in mid-July (Deputy PM/Foreign Minister Ishaq Dar attended the SCO Council of Foreign Ministers in Tianjin) and the heads-of-state summit led by the prime minister at end-August/early-September.

Islamabad has publicly framed SCO engagement as a means to deepen regional trade, digital connectivity and industrial cooperation; however, Pakistan-specific project financing tied directly to the Tianjin outcomes has not been detailed in FO or APP readouts to date.

Official Chinese readouts depict the Tianjin summit as the SCO’s most expansive agenda to date, moving beyond traditional security coordination into green industry and digital economy collaboration through newly announced platforms/centres and multi-year strategies.

For Pakistan, the potential lies in joining those platforms and leveraging the bloc’s large market share; concrete benefits will depend on follow-up agreements and project-level financing that Islamabad can secure in the coming months.

Credit: Independent News Pakistan (INP) — Pak-China