Where is the International Youth Summit Pakistan taking place?

The summit is being held in the city of Lahore, PAK.

What is the primary purpose of the IYSP?

The IYSP aims to bring together young leaders for dialogue and collaboration on global issues, fostering shared responsibility and leadership development.

IYSP 2026 — 4th International Youth Summit Pakistan

Name: IYSP 2026 — 4th International Youth Summit Pakistan
Start: 2026-11-27T00:00:00Z
End: 2026-12-04T00:00:00Z
Location: Lahore

Nov 27 – Dec 4, 2026Lahore, PakistanIn-person

Registration open

The International Youth Summit Pakistan (IYSP) is an event hosted in Lahore, PAK, bringing together young leaders from around the world. This iteration marks the fourth time the summit has been convened, providing a platform for dialogue and collaboration on pressing global issues. The event aims to foster a sense of shared responsibility among youth for addressing complex international challenges.

Committees & topics

Topics
Geopolitics and the Shifting World Order · Regional Connectivity and Geo-Economics · Governance, Security and Emerging Threats · Strategic Technologies and Digital Governance · Youth Leadership and Global Dialogue

Why it matters

The IYSP is significant because it convenes young minds in a critical region, offering a unique opportunity for cross-cultural exchange and the development of leadership skills. By focusing on international cooperation, the summit encourages participants to think beyond national borders and consider global solutions to shared problems. This type of engagement is crucial for cultivating a new generation of diplomats and policymakers who are equipped to navigate an increasingly interconnected world.

Furthermore, the summit's location in Lahore, PAK, provides a distinct geopolitical context for discussions. Participants will have the chance to engage with issues from a perspective rooted in a country that plays a vital role in regional stability and international relations. The interactions and ideas generated at the IYSP can contribute to a broader understanding of global dynamics and potentially influence future policy directions.

How to prepare

Delegates preparing for the IYSP should focus on developing a robust understanding of current international affairs and the specific challenges facing youth globally. It is advisable to research the host country, PAK, to understand its geopolitical landscape and its role in regional and international contexts. This will enable more informed and nuanced participation in discussions.

Consider exploring topics related to What Is Stakeholder Mapping? and Engagement Strategies to effectively contribute to collaborative problem-solving. Understanding Gender Dynamics Across Cultures can also be particularly relevant for fostering inclusive dialogue. Participants should be prepared to engage in Dynamic Analysis of complex issues, drawing on diverse perspectives to formulate constructive proposals.

Country perspectives

Where the most-relevant 1 countries stand on the core issues in play. Click through for the full country profile.

Pakistan

As the host nation, PAK provides the geographical and cultural backdrop for the summit, offering its unique regional perspective on global challenges.

Role in topic

PAK plays a central role by hosting the event in Lahore, facilitating international youth dialogue and showcasing its commitment to fostering global youth leadership. The country's geopolitical position influences the discussions and perspectives shared at the summit.

Topics & background

The background behind each topic and the actors that shape it.

Geopolitics and the Shifting World Order

The post-Cold War unipolar moment, in which the United States set the terms of the international system, has given way to a more contested multipolar landscape. China's economic rise, Russia's 2022 invasion of Ukraine, the expansion of BRICS to include states such as Iran, the UAE, Egypt and Ethiopia in 2024, and the diminishing weight of Western-led institutions have collectively reshaped how power is distributed and exercised. Sanctions regimes, currency diversification away from the US dollar, and parallel development banks like the AIIB and NDB illustrate how alternative architectures are being built alongside — and sometimes against — the Bretton Woods order. For Pakistan and the wider Global South, this transition is double-edged. It opens space for non-alignment, hedging, and diversified partnerships, but it also raises the risk of being caught between rival blocs in conflicts ranging from the Taiwan Strait to the Red Sea. Flashpoints in Ukraine, Gaza, the South China Sea, and the Sahel test the credibility of the UN Security Council, whose paralysis has revived debates over veto reform and the General Assembly's Uniting for Peace mechanism. The core dispute today is whether the emerging order will be genuinely multipolar and rules-based, a bifurcated US–China cold-war structure, or a fragmented 'à la carte' system in which middle powers transact issue-by-issue. The outcome will shape trade, security alliances, technology standards, and the legitimacy of global governance for a generation.

Key players

Regional Connectivity and Geo-Economics

Connectivity has become the new currency of geopolitics in Eurasia. China's Belt and Road Initiative, launched in 2013, anchored a wave of cross-border infrastructure projects, with the China–Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) as its flagship. In response, the G7 unveiled the Partnership for Global Infrastructure and Investment in 2022, the EU launched Global Gateway, and the India–Middle East–Europe Economic Corridor (IMEC) was announced at the 2023 G20 in New Delhi. The reopening of Central Asian trade routes, the International North–South Transport Corridor through Iran, and renewed interest in the TAPI gas pipeline have turned South and Central Asia into a contested but economically promising crossroads. Geo-economics now blends trade, finance, and security. Sanctions on Russia and Iran, export controls on advanced semiconductors, the weaponization of supply chains for critical minerals, and Gulf sovereign wealth investment flows have all blurred the line between commerce and statecraft. For Pakistan, hosting Gwadar port and bordering Iran, Afghanistan, China and India makes it both a beneficiary and a potential casualty of corridor competition. The central questions are how regional states can attract investment without falling into debt distress (as several BRI recipients have), how to harmonize standards across competing corridors, and whether SAARC-style regional cooperation can be revived or supplanted by SCO and ECO frameworks.

Key players

Governance, Security and Emerging Threats

Across South and Central Asia, governance challenges and hard-security threats have become deeply intertwined. The Taliban's return to power in Kabul in August 2021 has been followed by a resurgence of Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) attacks, a sharp rise in cross-border militancy, and renewed activity by Islamic State Khorasan Province. Pakistan has experienced its deadliest years of terrorism in over a decade, while political instability, economic stress, and IMF conditionality have strained state capacity. In the wider region, Iran–Pakistan border strikes in January 2024, the Sudan war, and the Gaza conflict illustrate how internal fragility and external escalation reinforce each other. Beyond kinetic threats, governments face hybrid and emerging risks: disinformation campaigns, transnational organized crime, climate-induced displacement, and the financing of violent non-state actors through cryptocurrencies and illicit trade. The Financial Action Task Force grey-listing process and UN sanctions regimes (notably Resolution 1591 on Sudan and 1267 on terrorism financing) remain central instruments, but enforcement is uneven. The core debate is how to balance counter-terrorism imperatives with human rights, how to engage de facto authorities like the Taliban without legitimizing them, and how to build resilient governance institutions that can withstand both internal shocks and external interference.

Key players

Strategic Technologies and Digital Governance

Artificial intelligence, semiconductors, quantum computing, biotechnology, and space systems have moved to the center of strategic competition. US export controls on advanced chips to China (expanded in 2022 and 2023), the EU AI Act adopted in 2024, and the UN Global Digital Compact agreed at the 2024 Summit of the Future have set the early contours of digital governance. At the same time, the GGE and OEWG processes on information and communications technologies continue to debate norms of responsible state behavior in cyberspace, while the Group of Governmental Experts on Lethal Autonomous Weapons Systems remains deadlocked over binding rules. For developing economies, the central concern is avoiding a new digital dependency. Cloud infrastructure, undersea cables, payment rails, and AI foundation models are concentrated in a handful of jurisdictions, raising questions about data sovereignty, algorithmic accountability, and the affordability of compute. India's UPI and Aadhaar, and emerging Pakistani initiatives like Raast, illustrate how digital public infrastructure can be a tool of inclusion — but also of surveillance if safeguards are weak. The key dispute is whether technology governance should be led by techno-democratic coalitions (G7, OECD, Bletchley/Seoul AI summits), by UN-anchored multilateral processes, or by industry self-regulation. The OHCHR's 2024 work on AI and human rights, and ongoing debates on autonomous weapons, are testing whether universal standards can keep pace with the technology.

Key players

Youth Leadership and Global Dialogue

Roughly 1.2 billion people worldwide are between the ages of 15 and 24, and the Global South — particularly South Asia, Africa, and parts of the Middle East — hosts the largest youth cohorts in history. Pakistan itself has one of the youngest populations among major economies, with about 64 percent under the age of 30. Yet youth remain structurally under-represented in formal decision-making: the average age of parliamentarians globally is well above 50, and only a small fraction of UN member states have youth delegates at the General Assembly. Initiatives such as the UN Secretary-General's Youth Office (established 2023), the Our Common Agenda Youth Engagement track, and Security Council Resolution 2250 on Youth, Peace and Security have sought to close this gap. Youth-led movements have nonetheless reshaped global agendas — from climate activism following the 2018 school strikes, to pro-democracy mobilization in Myanmar and Iran, to civic-tech and entrepreneurship ecosystems across Africa and South Asia. The challenge is translating episodic mobilization into durable institutional voice, particularly in regions where civic space is narrowing. The core questions concern how to operationalize meaningful youth participation in diplomacy, peacebuilding, and economic policy; how to address youth unemployment and brain drain in middle-income states; and how cross-border youth dialogue platforms can build trust in a polarized international environment.

Key players

Resources

News, lessons, and country profiles to prep for IYSP 2026 — 4th International Youth Summit Pakistan.

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Lessons

Bite-sized lessons to build the basics

Hidden Stakeholders

Engagement Strategies

Dynamic Analysis

Stakeholder Mapping Workshop

Courses

Guided courses that go deeper on the topic

Crisis Management

Advanced Negotiation

Multilateral Negotiation

Policy Brief Writing

The states in play, with the data that shapes their stance

Country dossier

Country dossier

Country dossier

Country dossier

Country dossier

Country dossier

Country dossier

Country dossier

Country dossier

Country dossier

Country dossier

Country dossier

Country dossier

Country dossier

Country dossier

Pakistan November 2026

By committee

Frequently asked questions

IYSP 2026 — 4th International Youth Summit Pakistan

Nov 27 – Dec 4, 2026Lahore, PakistanIn-person

Registration open

Committees & topics

Topics
Geopolitics and the Shifting World Order · Regional Connectivity and Geo-Economics · Governance, Security and Emerging Threats · Strategic Technologies and Digital Governance · Youth Leadership and Global Dialogue

Why it matters

How to prepare

Country perspectives

Where the most-relevant 1 countries stand on the core issues in play. Click through for the full country profile.

Pakistan

As the host nation, PAK provides the geographical and cultural backdrop for the summit, offering its unique regional perspective on global challenges.

Role in topic