On June 9, 2018, the SCO Secretary-General chaired a regular format meeting with top administrative officials of the CIS, CSTO and SCO in Qingdao.
The meeting was attended by Chairman of the Executive Committee — Executive Secretary of the CIS Sergei Lebedev and Secretary-General of the CSTO Yury Khachaturov.
The SCO Secretary-General thanked the leaders of the CIS and the CSTO for participating in the SCO summit, underlining the importance of building ties and maintaining regular contacts between the leaders of the three organisations.
The tripartite meeting included an in-depth exchange of views on the security situation and on the development of the trade, economic, cultural and humanitarian cooperation in Eurasia.
The participants acknowledged the need for further consolidation of efforts and improvement of international counterterrorism cooperation and agreed that such interaction should be carried out with the central coordinating role of the United Nations on the basis of strict observance of its Charter and norms of international law, and rejection of double standards.
The SCO Secretary-General welcomed the Memorandum of Understanding on cooperation and interaction between the CSTO Secretariat, the CIS Anti-Terrorism Centre and the SCO Regional Anti-Terrorist Structure signed in May 2018, and expressed confidence that it would lend a new impetus to cooperation between these partners in the interest of solving common specific strategic tasks. This is also a practical confirmation of the growing role of cooperation between various regional international associations and in the global context, he added.
They noted the importance of the adoption of the SCO Heads of State Joint Appeal to Youth, as well as the Programme of Action for its Implementation, at the upcoming SCO Summit aimed at preventing the involvement of youth in the activities of terrorist and extremist organisations.
The sides also expressed concern over the growing threats related to illicit drug trafficking and underlined the need to develop a joint approach in this area.
The tripartite meeting was held in a traditionally friendly and constructive atmosphere.
The Shanghai Cooperation Organisation, the Commonwealth of Independent States and the Collective Security Treaty Organisation are partner organisations (since April 2005 and October 2007, respectively) developing cooperation based on the Memoranda of Understanding between them.