The general debate of the 81st U.N. General Assembly closed this week, and the Central Asian speeches put the region’s balancing act on full display. As the world moves toward multipolarity, the five Central Asian states find themselves in a tight spot. They must manage relations with the two leading global powers, the United States and China, while preserving their ties with Russia, with which they share deep historical, economic, and political bonds.

Three weeks before the debate opened, Kyrgyzstan hosted the Shanghai Cooperation Organization’s (SCO) 25th-anniversary summit on August 31 and September 1. Four of the five Central Asian states – Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan – are SCO members, while neutral Turkmenistan remains formally out, although it occasionally participates as a guest. The SCO is widely seen as a vehicle for Beijing and Moscow to limit Washington’s footprint in Eurasia, and the 2026 summit’s Bishkek Declaration gave the United States plenty to dislike, from a firm condemnation of military strikes on Iran to opposition to “unilateral coercive measures.”

Taken together, the two gatherings reveal a clear division of labor in Central Asian diplomacy. The region’s governments echo Beijing’s and Moscow’s grievances in regional group settings like the SCO, court Washington with concrete deals via bilateral channels, and use the U.N. General Assembly (UNGA) podium to say as little as possible that might offend any of the three.

The balancing starts with who showed up. Presidents Kassym-Jomart Tokayev, Emomali Rahmon, Shavkat Mirziyoyev, and Sadyr Japarov all attended the SCO summit in person, alongside China’s Xi Jinping, Russia’s Vladimir Putin, and India’s Narendra Modi. Three weeks later, only Japarov traveled to New York, after making a stop in the U.S. state of Utah. All five Central Asian countries had sent their heads of state last year for the U.N.’s 80th anniversary. Xi and Modi also skipped this year’s session, though Xi was in Washington on a state visit around the same time.

This does not mean, however, that Central Asia has abandoned Washington for its rivals. Kazakhstan, for one, backed Security Council Resolution 2803, the November 2025 measure endorsing Trump’s Gaza peace plan and his Board of Peace, even though Russia and China abstained. Tokayev sits on that board. Kazakhstan, which announced it would join the Abraham Accords last November, also took part in its first accords meeting in New York on September 24. Japarov, for his part, carried the SCO’s complaint about Western sanctions to the UNGA podium, yet he also thanked Trump for cutting U.S. funding to foreign NGOs.

These are low-cost gestures aimed at a transactional White House, and they come bundled with commerce. In mid-October, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio will lead a delegation of more than 100 American companies to Samarkand for a C5+1 ministerial meeting, his first trip to the region. With the United States and China racing to secure critical minerals, Central Asian capitals have something Washington wants.

Beijing, meanwhile, offers trade on a scale Washington cannot match. Xi paired the Bishkek summit with a state visit to Kyrgyzstan and pledged an SCO center for AI cooperation and 100 joint technology projects over three years. He arrived as the region’s largest trading partner, after China-Central Asia goods trade hit a record $106 billion last year. In Bishkek, all four Central Asian members also reaffirmed their support for China’s Belt and Road Initiative. Competition between the two powers lets Central Asian capitals bargain with both.

Central Asia is also building influence inside the U.N. system, and the great power scramble for its mineral wealth may give it more leverage to raise its global profile. Kyrgyzstan joins the Security Council in January, having been elected with 142 votes in June. Tajikistan used its UNGA address to announce its first-ever U.N. Security Council bid, for 2028-2029. Uzbekistan declared its candidacy for 2035-2036 and will chair the Non-Aligned Movement next year, while Turkmenistan will chair the group of landlocked developing countries.

Uzbekistan’s statement, delivered by the president’s daughter and head of the presidential administration Saida Mirziyoyeva, captured the balancing act neatly. Observing that countries are being asked which side they choose, Mirziyoyeva answered with “human dignity” rather than a camp, echoing the Bishkek Declaration’s own rejection of “bloc-based and confrontational” approaches. Uzbek President Mirziyoyev sat beside Xi and Putin in Bishkek; next month, Samarkand hosts Rubio.

Central Asia’s multivector strategy has not disappeared, but it has changed form. The region now aligns rhetorically with Beijing and Moscow in regional group settings, materially with Washington in bilateral deals, and with no one in particular at the United Nations. As great power rivalry intensifies, the open questions are how long Central Asian governments can hold this position and how much they can gain from it.