The Samarkand meeting marks a decade of engagement between the United States and Central Asia, reflecting the region’s growing strategic importance, Kazakhstan’s role in advancing regional diplomacy, and a shift toward more ambitious economic cooperation.
Sapargali Shalgimbayev.
In 2015, the United States and the five Central Asian countries established a diplomatic platform that reflected a relatively simple proposition: the region’s challenges and opportunities were better addressed through sustained regional dialogue than through five separate bilateral relationships.
A decade later, the C5+1 format has become one of the principal mechanisms for engagement between Washington and Central Asia. The ministerial meeting held in Samarkand on Oct. 19, 2026, marked its tenth anniversary at a time when transport connectivity, critical minerals, energy security, and resilient supply chains are reshaping the region’s international significance.
The platform’s evolution tells a broader story about Central Asia itself. Once frequently approached through the strategic priorities of its larger neighbors, the region is increasingly developing its own diplomatic agenda, seeking investment from multiple partners and positioning itself as a bridge between major markets.
From a regional initiative to a presidential-level platform
The origins of C5+1 are important to understanding its significance today. The format was formally established in 2015, when the foreign ministers of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan met U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry in Samarkand. The meeting followed an earlier gathering in New York and established a commitment to regular consultations.
Kazakhstan played a consequential role in advancing the concept of a regional mechanism for engagement with Washington. Policy discussions and proposals developed through Kazakh-American channels helped shape the idea that ultimately became C5+1. Its establishment, however, required the participation and support of all five Central Asian countries and the United States.
The underlying logic was straightforward but ambitious: Central Asia could strengthen its international standing by engaging major external partners collectively while preserving each country’s sovereignty and independent foreign policy.
For several years, C5+1 developed primarily through ministerial meetings, working groups, and cooperation on security, economic development, and environmental issues. Its institutional foundations gradually strengthened. A C5+1 Secretariat was established in 2022, while working groups expanded cooperation in the economy, energy and environment, and security.
The decisive political milestone came in September 2023, when then-U.S. President Joe Biden hosted the first-ever C5+1 presidential summit on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly in New York.
The participation of all five Central Asian presidents elevated the platform to an entirely new level. It demonstrated that Washington was prepared to engage the region collectively at the highest political level and that Central Asian governments were willing to coordinate their priorities within a shared diplomatic framework.
The New York Declaration emphasized sovereignty, territorial integrity, regional connectivity, energy cooperation, and security. It also reflected a growing recognition that Central Asia’s economic potential and geopolitical position warranted sustained attention from the United States.
The significance of the 2023 summit was therefore not simply that six presidents sat around the same table. It was that a format originally built around ministerial consultations had developed into a platform capable of supporting strategic dialogue at the highest level.
Why the past few years have mattered most
Although C5+1 was established in 2015, its more recent development has been particularly consequential. The platform has increasingly moved beyond diplomatic declarations toward commercial engagement, infrastructure development, and cooperation on strategic resources.
The November 2025 C5+1 summit in Washington D.C., hosted by President Donald Trump, reinforced this shift. According to U.S. officials, the meetings generated more than $25 billion in commercial deals and commitments across sectors including transportation, energy, finance, and other industries. These figures represent announced agreements and commitments rather than completed investments.
The economic dimension is essential. For Central Asian governments, closer relations with the United States can support investment diversification, access to advanced technologies, industrial development, and the expansion of export markets. For Washington, the region offers opportunities to strengthen commercial ties, diversify supply chains, and develop partnerships in sectors increasingly important to economic and national security.
The latest meeting in Samarkand continued this trajectory.
U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio met with the foreign ministers of the five Central Asian countries to discuss economic cooperation, regional connectivity, energy, critical minerals, and security. The joint statement reaffirmed a vision of the United States and Central Asia as long-term partners.
One of the most consequential priorities was the development of the Trans-Caspian International Transport Route, commonly known as the Middle Corridor. By connecting Central Asia across the Caspian Sea to the South Caucasus and European markets, the route offers opportunities to diversify trade connections and strengthen the resilience of international supply chains.
For Kazakhstan, this agenda has direct strategic implications. As a major regional economy with extensive transport infrastructure and access to the Caspian Sea, the country has a strong interest in improving logistics, harmonizing customs procedures, and attracting investment into transport and industrial facilities.
The Samarkand discussions also highlighted critical minerals and their processing. Rather than focusing exclusively on the extraction of raw materials, the countries have an opportunity to develop higher-value production, establish industrial capacity, and integrate into international supply chains for advanced manufacturing and energy technologies.
These priorities connect regional diplomacy with tangible economic interests. The central question is increasingly not whether Central Asia attracts international attention, but how effectively the region can translate that attention into long-term development.
Kazakhstan and the value of regional diplomacy
For Kazakhstan, the development of C5+1 fits within a broader multivector foreign policy aimed at maintaining constructive relations with major powers while protecting national interests and expanding economic opportunities.
Regional engagement adds an important dimension to this approach. By working through C5+1, Kazakhstan can pursue bilateral priorities with Washington while also supporting initiatives that benefit Central Asia as a whole.
This is particularly relevant in transport connectivity, investment promotion, energy security, and the diversification of export routes. Infrastructure networks and supply chains rarely stop at national borders. Their commercial viability depends on coordination among neighboring countries, predictable regulations, and efficient cross-border procedures.
The same logic applies to security. Cooperation on counterterrorism, border management, cybersecurity, and transnational crime can be more effective when national efforts are complemented by regional dialogue and international partnerships.
Kazakhstan’s role in advancing the original concept of C5+1 also illustrates a broader point: regional countries do not need to remain passive recipients of great-power strategies. They can help shape the mechanisms through which external powers engage with them.
At the same time, the effectiveness of the platform depends on maintaining a balance between collective priorities and national interests. The five Central Asian countries have different economic structures, political priorities, and relationships with external partners. C5+1 is most useful when it accommodates those differences while identifying areas where cooperation produces clear mutual benefits.
A changing geopolitical landscape
The renewed attention to Central Asia is taking place amid intensifying competition over transport routes, energy resources, critical minerals, and technological supply chains.
The region’s geography gives it a distinctive position at the intersection of Europe and Asia. Its economic potential, natural resources, and proximity to major markets have become increasingly relevant as governments and businesses seek to diversify trade and reduce vulnerabilities.
Yet it would be misleading to interpret C5+1 simply as a geopolitical instrument directed against another power. Central Asian governments have consistently pursued diversified international partnerships, maintaining relations with Russia, China, Europe, the United States, and other partners.
Their objective is not necessarily to choose one external partner over another. It is to expand their room for maneuver, attract investment, and ensure that international engagement contributes to national development.
For Washington, sustained engagement offers an opportunity to become a more significant economic and strategic partner in a region that U.S. officials have acknowledged deserves greater attention. For Central Asia, the value of that engagement will ultimately depend on whether diplomatic commitments lead to new markets, productive investment, technology transfer, and better infrastructure.
The question is therefore one of implementation rather than diplomatic symbolism.
Looking toward 2027 and beyond
The prospect of further high-level U.S. engagement, including the prospect of a regional visit by President Donald Trump in 2027 as referenced in remarks attributed to Secretary of State Rubio, would reinforce the momentum generated by recent C5+1 meetings. The timing and details of any such visit would need to be confirmed through official announcements.
More important than any single visit, however, is whether the platform can maintain political attention between summits and ministerial meetings.
The tenth anniversary provides an opportunity to assess what C5+1 has achieved and what its next phase should deliver. The platform has moved from its founding ministerial meeting in Samarkand to a presidential summit in New York in 2023, another presidential-level gathering in Washington in 2025, and renewed ministerial engagement in Samarkand in 2026.
That progression is evidence of institutional continuity and growing political relevance. But longevity alone is not a measure of success.
The next stage should prioritize the implementation of existing agreements, stronger links between government dialogue and private-sector participation, and measurable progress on transport connectivity, investment, critical-mineral processing, and regional trade.
The relationship between C5+1 and the B5+1 business platform could also help turn diplomatic priorities into commercially viable projects by bringing companies and investors more directly into the process.
Ultimately, the significance of C5+1 lies in the gradual transformation of how Central Asia engages with the world. A mechanism conceived as a framework for regular consultations has evolved into a channel for high-level diplomacy and increasingly ambitious economic cooperation.
For Kazakhstan and its neighbors, the challenge is to ensure that this progress strengthens regional agency rather than merely reflecting the strategic priorities of external powers.
Ten years after its establishment, C5+1 has demonstrated that sustained diplomacy can create a platform with growing strategic weight. Its next decade will be judged by a more demanding standard: whether that platform can deliver lasting economic opportunities, stronger regional connectivity, and tangible benefits for the people of Central Asia.
The author is Sapargali Shalgimbayev, the president of the CFive Intellectual Platform.
Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the position of The Astana Times.
