The scope of the department includes the organisation of international conferences, meetings and scientific seminars at the bilateral level, preparation of documents for cooperation between SAS and foreign partners for central government administration bodies, especially for the Ministry of Education, Science, Research and Sport of the Slovak Republic and the Ministry of Foreign and European Affairs of the Slovak Republic. The department also ensures the sending of important SAS representatives abroad, actively participates in the preparation of visits of important scientific personalities from all over the world to the SAS premises and ensures the reception of foreign and Slovak ambassadors in cooperation with the Secretariat of the President of the SAS.
The department ensures international scientific cooperation mainly based on the bilateral inter-academic agreements of the SAS on scientific cooperation. Since 2020, these agreements have been concluded in accordance with the principles of the Mobility Programme. The SAS has signed bilateral agreements within the scope of the Mobility Programme with partner organisations in Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Serbia, Romania, Italy and Germany, and similar agreements are being prepared with other long-term partners from the V4 countries – Hungary and Poland. These agreements aim at solving joint projects. SAS is also developing cooperation with other countries such as South Korea, China, Taiwan, Israel, Norway, Greece, Spain and the United Kingdom. However, this cooperation is not yet institutionalized. The department is actively engaged in cooperation within the V4 Academies Forum, closely cooperating mainly with the Czech Academy of Sciences.
The scope of the department within SAS also includes support for excellent research and cooperation with international scientific organisations such as ALLEA (All European Academies), EASAC (European Academies Science Advisory Council) and ISC (International Science Council).
The Bilateral Cooperation Department is actively involved in the activities of the SAS Commission for International Relations.