First ever summit of GCC states and five Central Asian countries will begin in Jeddah on Wednesday

On Wednesday, the first-ever meeting of Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) nations and five Central Asian countries will begin in Jeddah. Officials from the six GCC nations, as well as Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, and Kazakhstan, will attend the summit. The summit will examine measures to increase bilateral collaboration and coordination in a variety of disciplines.

The first Gulf-Central Asian conference, according to Uzbek Deputy Foreign Minister Bakhromjon Aloev, is a new kind of interregional cooperation between two highly significant areas in the globe in terms of geopolitics and geographical economics.

The summit is being conducted in response to the rising regional and worldwide interest and competitiveness in the five Central Asian nations, as a result of their position and geostrategic importance, as well as the natural riches that these countries possess, which qualify them for significant developmental leaps.

Despite being landlocked, the Central Asian area "represents the heart of the earth," according to British geographer John Mackinder, one of geopolitics' pioneers, who claims that "whoever controls it controls the world."

The Gulf countries, particularly Saudi Arabia, were among the first to seek to expand relations with Central Asian countries, owing to historical ties between the two regions and the fact that the region is a natural extension of the Gulf region, and it and the Arabs were part of a major Islamic empire for centuries.