Security Building in Central Asia and the Shanghai Cooperation Organization

The formation of the Shanghai Five, the prototype of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization,1 was related first and fore-most to security motivations, although the concept of “security” has had various meanings. The Shanghai Five traces its origins to the bilateral negotia-tions on border problems between China and Russia that were re-sumed in November 1989.2 Before the Almaty Summit of the Shanghai Five that was held in 1998, the Five’s main concern had been the security of the borders and border areas between China 1 “Shanghai Five ” is not the formal name of the forum. Actually, the forum had no formal name. In April 26, 1996 presidents of five states, Russia