On February 9, 2007 the Institute for Public Policy (IPP) hosted a roundtable discussion "The SCO Summit 2007: Opportunities for Kyrgyzstan." Attending the closed expert discussion, moderated by Muratbek Imanaliev, IPP President, were Tolondu Makeev, Kyrgyz national coordinator for Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), Erlan Abdyldaev, foreign policy expert of IPP, Ishenbai Abdrazakov, chair of Observers board of the Foundation for Political Research «The Project of Future» and Andrey Filatov, deputy of Bishkek city council.

Muratbek Imanaliev, moderating the discussion, opened the floor by summarizing the importance of upcoming SCO Summit for Kyrgyzstan.

According to him, on the one hand, by organizing the event with great care, the country has a unique opportunity to promote its interests within the organization. SCO is such an institution, where decisions are made through consensus, and Kyrgyzstan should take advantage of that. It would be important to see that Kyrgyzstan acts on behalf of the Central Asian region in general and its own interests in particular, said the moderator.

On the other hand, surfacing on the ground recently were the concerns that Kyrgyzstan is not ready to host such a high-profile event, not the least of in terms of sheer logistics and organizational issues. In addition, views were expressed in the city council of Bishkek, where the event will be held, that in preparing for the summit, Kyrgyz government is putting enormous pressure on the city, both in financial and administrative terms.

With this introduction, Tolondu Makeev entered the discussion, by noting that the Kyrgyz side is hastily getting prepared for the event, which is scheduled for July 10 this year. The organizing committee lost 3 months last year due to political instability in autumn 2006 and is now working every day to catch up with all the delays. Unfortunately, construction of new infrastructure in Bishkek has been behind the schedule, despite the involvement of Chinese construction companies. It was agreed now that instead, existing buildings in Bishkek, such as the city Philharmonic and government residences will be renovated on time for the event.

Another important side of the event is that the summit should result in signing of a Declaration, for which the Kyrgyz side is preparing with full force. Regular meetings with SCO apparatus from other member-states will help clarify and prepare the draft of the Declaration. Expert input on main ideas to be included in the Declaration is welcomed, emphasized Makeev.

Erlan Abdyldaev pointed out two issues. One was the issue of security during the event. If the other member-states get concerned about traditional tension in the south and the political situation in Kyrgyzstan, the atmosphere of the Bishkek summit might resemble the  Dushanbe summit in 2000, when security concerns featured high during preparation, to a point that participating member states have thought of rescheduling the event in a different setting. It would be a great loss, if a sudden worsening of the political environment in Kyrgyzstan and new rounds of standoff between the government and the opposition altogether precluded the holding of the Summit in Bishkek, Abdyldaev added.  

Second issue, more importantly, was that Kyrgyzstan, a country hosting an American military airbase, could use the opportunity to generate discussion within SCO, so that the organization should engage in more contacts and talks with the West, namely NATO and EU, as well as the United States. There was a sense that SCO has recently been too isolated from the global process of interaction among the chief powers and was used only to promote successful military cooperation, along with few declarative statements on economic cooperation.

Ishenbay Abdrazakov said that in hosting the SCO summit Kyrgyzstan should be extremely clear about its own interests. Spending huge funds (by some estimates up to 2 billion soms) and putting in all this efforts and energy, what should the returns be for Kyrgyzstan? Perhaps we should get more practical and use the opportunity to talk about how to lessen the negative impact for smaller states like Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan of too close a collaboration with such giants as China and Russia, asked Abdrazakov.

Next speaker Andrey Filatov focused on the way the preparations for the summit are being undermined by financial reform started by the Ministry of finances. According to him, as part of the experimental budget reform, aimed at introducing a two-tier budget system, as of January 2007, more than 50% of Bishkek's revenue was being taken away to state budget, which is a lot more than before. At the same time, Bishkek doesn't see how even part of this money is going towards the needs of the Summit. According to Filatov, as Bishkek municipal authorities realize that the new budgetary regulations will make the city bankrupt in few months, the standoff with the republican government will greatly distract from the important event in July.  

Another disturbing tendency is that the organizing committee is using old administrative methods and forcing all government employees, including schoolteachers and doctors to participate in massive clean-up actions on Bishkek's streets. This is causing a lot of discontent and is not the way to get the city ready for the SCO summit noted the deputy.

In the discussion part, all roundtable speakers made interesting suggestions. Erlan Abdyldaev said that Kyrgyzstan should soon come up with an initiative on several states, that are eager to join SCO, including Sri Lanka, Belarus and Iran. Despite all controversy, surrounding the interest shown for instance from Iran, perhaps a transitional status, something close to that of observer states, should be introduced, to keep the attention of such states. Muratbek Imanaliev suggested that Kyrgyzstan could lobby an SCO project that would focus on decreasing the gaps in development of such big states as Russia and China and smaller members as Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan.

Experts recommended following steps to help better organize the Summit:

• 1) Organize a meeting, with participation of the president, prime minister, head of presidential administration, ministers of foreign affairs, finances and economics, and the mayor of Bishkek discussing the financial side of the event
• 2) Prepare project materials that reflect the interests of Kyrgyzstan
• 3) Kyrgyzstan should come up on the SCO summit with an initiative of a program that would replace HIPC and the Millennium Development Goals program
• 4) Hold a presidential conference of member-states, partners, observer states and SCO guests as part of the summit