BAKU, Azerbaijan, August 13. Kazakhstan expects stronger transport and commercial links across Central Asia and increased investment in energy, critical minerals and digital infrastructure over the next three years.
This was reflected in a publication of the Caspian Policy Center following Kazakh Ambassador to the U.S. Magzhan Ilyassov's remarks during a roundtable hosted by the Center on Trans-Caspian cooperation.
According to Ilyassov, the Cholpon-Ata summit reflects the objective of the “C5 plus one” format and goes beyond cooperation among the Central Asian countries.
“In three years from now, we want to see more projects across the region with stronger transport and commercial links and create investment growth between energy, critical minerals, and digital infrastructure,” Ilyassov said.
He also said that the Cholpon-Ata summit “is not just us working together,” but mirrors the objective of the C5 plus one format.
The Cholpon-Ata Declaration was signed on July 31, 2026, by the presidents of the five Central Asian countries and Azerbaijan at an informal meeting in Kyrgyzstan. The document formalized the expanded regional cooperation format following Azerbaijan’s integration into the Central Asian consultative process and places greater emphasis on practical cooperation in trade, transport, logistics and energy.
The declaration comes as the expanded six-country format, often described as C6, seeks to translate growing political coordination into economic and infrastructure projects. Areas discussed in the regional framework include the Trans-Caspian transport route, energy cooperation, critical minerals and digital infrastructure. The broader agenda is aimed at strengthening connectivity between Central Asia, the Caspian Sea and markets beyond the region.
The Caspian Policy Center (CPC), which hosted the roundtable attended by the ambassadors, is a Washington-based nonprofit think tank focused on economic, political, energy and security issues in the Greater Caspian region. It organizes research, policy discussions and forums bringing together government officials, business representatives and experts from the region and the United States.
