Tariq Saeedi
We live in an age where a farmer in rural Africa can access weather predictions through a smartphone, where telemedicine connects patients in remote villages to specialists thousands of miles away, and where artificial intelligence promises to revolutionize everything from education to agriculture.
Yet we also live in an age where these same technologies are becoming weapons of geopolitical competition, where access to innovation increasingly depends on which side of an invisible line a country falls, and where the digital divide threatens to become a chasm that separates not just the connected from the disconnected, but the empowered from the powerless.
As nations race to dominate emerging technologies—artificial intelligence, quantum computing, biotechnology—the world faces a troubling paradox.
The very innovations that could lift billions out of poverty and solve humanity’s most pressing challenges are being locked behind walls of strategic competition. Export controls tighten. Technology ecosystems fracture into competing spheres. Developing nations find themselves forced to choose sides in contests they never asked to join, often at the cost of accessing the tools they desperately need for development.
In this landscape, an old diplomatic concept deserves fresh consideration: neutrality.
Not the neutrality of isolation or indifference, but the active, principled neutrality that creates space for dialogue when tensions rise and facilitates cooperation when interests diverge. Could the same framework that has enabled neutral nations to broker peace, host humanitarian initiatives, and bridge political divides also serve as a pathway for more equitable sharing of scientific and technological progress?
When Technology Becomes Territory
The politicization of technology is not entirely new, but its scope and intensity have reached unprecedented levels. During the Cold War, certain technologies were restricted, but the competition was largely binary and the technological landscape simpler.
Today, the competition is multipolar, the technologies are transformative, and the stakes involve not just military advantage but economic survival and social development.
Consider the contemporary reality: Advanced semiconductor technology faces export restrictions. AI development tools are subject to national security reviews. Cloud computing services fragment along geopolitical lines.
Even scientific collaboration—once held as a universal good—now triggers security concerns and visa restrictions.
The practical effect is that countries in the developing world, which arguably have the most to gain from technological advancement, find themselves navigating an increasingly complex maze of restrictions, requirements, and implicit pressures.
The humanitarian cost is tangible.
A medical AI system that could diagnose diseases in areas with few doctors remains unavailable because of licensing restrictions. Agricultural technology that could improve crop yields stays confined to certain markets. Educational platforms that could democratize learning encounter barriers to deployment.
The irony is bitter: technologies explicitly designed to solve global problems become entangled in the very political divisions they might help transcend.
The Neutral Advantage in a Connected World
History offers intriguing hints about what neutral spaces can accomplish. Switzerland didn’t just avoid taking sides in conflicts; it became the place where adversaries could meet, where humanitarian principles could be codified, where the International Committee of the Red Cross could operate with credibility precisely because of Swiss neutrality. During the Cold War, when scientific exchange between East and West faced severe restrictions, neutral countries sometimes provided venues where researchers could collaborate despite their governments’ antagonism.
These historical examples point to something valuable: trust.
When countries or organizations operate from a position of permanent neutrality, when they’ve formally committed to non-alignment and built institutions around that commitment, they acquire a different kind of currency in international relations. They become potentially acceptable to all parties precisely because they threaten none.
In the context of technology, this matters more than we might initially assume. Technology transfer isn’t just about moving equipment or sharing blueprints—it involves trust that the knowledge won’t be immediately weaponized, confidence that cooperation won’t create strategic vulnerabilities, and belief that the partnership serves mutual benefit rather than hidden agendas.
A truly neutral intermediary could, in theory, reduce these concerns.
Imagining Mechanisms for Neutral Tech Cooperation
What might this look like in practice? The possibilities are largely unexplored, but we can sketch some realistic frameworks.
A neutral country could host international dialogues on emerging technology governance where all parties feel comfortable participating. As artificial intelligence raises profound questions about ethics, safety, and societal impact, the world needs venues where diverse perspectives can be heard without any single power dominating the conversation. A neutral setting removes the suspicion that the dialogue is designed to advance one nation’s technological agenda over others.
Similarly, neutral territories could serve as locations for collaborative research initiatives that bring together scientists and engineers from countries that might not easily cooperate bilaterally.
Think of it as creating a commons for innovation—a space where the focus remains on solving shared problems rather than advancing national interests. The research itself stays open and accessible, with benefits flowing to all participants regardless of their geopolitical alignments.
Technology transfer presents particularly thorny challenges in our current environment. Developing nations need access to innovations in renewable energy, water purification, healthcare technology, and digital infrastructure. Yet direct transfers often trigger security concerns or get entangled in political conditions.
A neutral intermediary could potentially facilitate these transfers in ways that address security concerns while ensuring the technology reaches populations that need it most. The neutral party could verify appropriate use, provide training and support, and ensure that humanitarian objectives remain paramount.
There’s also potential for neutral countries to become testing grounds for inclusive digital policies. Before rolling out global governance frameworks for AI, data privacy, or digital currencies, wouldn’t it be valuable to test these approaches in environments that aren’t dominated by the commercial or political interests of major powers? A neutral country could experiment with policies designed primarily for human benefit rather than strategic advantage, creating models that other nations—particularly developing ones—could adapt to their own contexts.
Turkmenistan’s Opportunity Within This Framework
Turkmenistan’s permanent neutrality, recognized internationally and embedded in its constitution, creates a foundation upon which such initiatives could potentially be built.
The country’s geographic position, bridging Central Asia, the Middle East, and South Asia, places it at a crossroads of civilizations and interests. Its formal commitment to neutrality is not merely declarative but institutionalized through decades of practice.
The humanitarian dimension of neutrality, which Turkmenistan and other neutral nations have emphasized, naturally extends to scientific and technological domains. After all, what is humanitarian action in the 21st century if not ensuring that life-saving medical technologies, climate-resilient agricultural methods, and educational tools reach those who need them most?
The principles that guide neutral countries in conflict mediation—impartiality, independence, serving universal human welfare—apply equally well to technology cooperation.
For Turkmenistan specifically, this represents both an opportunity and a calling consistent with its neutral identity. It need not become a technology powerhouse itself to play a meaningful role. Rather, by offering neutral ground for cooperation, by facilitating dialogues that might not happen elsewhere, by hosting initiatives that serve genuinely humanitarian purposes, it could help ensure that technological progress serves all of humanity rather than deepening existing divisions.
The Path Forward
None of this will happen automatically. Creating effective mechanisms for neutral technology cooperation requires deliberate effort, institutional development, and sustained commitment.
It requires building relationships with international organizations working on technology and development. It means developing expertise not necessarily in creating cutting-edge technology, but in facilitating its ethical and equitable distribution.
It also requires a shift in how we think about neutrality itself. — For too long, neutrality has been conceived primarily in military and diplomatic terms—about avoiding conflicts and mediating disputes. These remain crucial functions. But the 21st century demands that we expand our understanding of what neutral countries can contribute.
Just as Switzerland’s neutrality evolved to encompass humanitarian leadership, just as Austria’s neutrality came to include hosting international organizations, so too can neutrality embrace a role in democratizing access to the technologies that will shape humanity’s future.
The digital age presents humanity with a choice. We can allow technology to become another domain of division, where innovation serves the powerful and widens gaps between nations and peoples. Or we can deliberately create pathways for cooperation, spaces where the benefits of scientific progress flow more freely across borders and political boundaries.
Neutral countries, by virtue of their unique position in the international system, could provide these pathways. They could become bridges in an increasingly fragmented technological landscape, trusted intermediaries in an age of suspicion, and advocates for ensuring that innovation serves universal human welfare.
This is not about claiming achievements that don’t yet exist. It’s about recognizing potential that remains largely untapped. It’s about asking whether the principles that have made neutrality valuable in preventing and resolving conflicts might also make it valuable in ensuring that humanity’s greatest innovations reach all of humanity, not just the privileged few.
The question isn’t whether neutral countries like Turkmenistan are currently playing this role at scale. The question is whether they should, whether they could, and whether the logic of neutrality in the 21st century demands it. We believe the answer to all three is yes.
If we’re serious about making scientific and technological progress truly serve humanity, we need institutions, frameworks, and nations committed to that vision above all others. We need spaces where cooperation isn’t conditional on political alignment, where access to innovation doesn’t depend on geopolitical calculations, and where the measure of success is human welfare rather than strategic advantage.
Neutrality, properly understood and actively practiced, could provide exactly that. The framework exists. The principles are established.
What remains is the will to extend them into this new and crucial domain—and the courage to imagine that old diplomatic concepts might hold answers to our newest and most pressing challenges. /// nCa, 8 December 2025