On Wednesday, India, as the current chair of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), will host a meeting of national security advisers (NSA) and top officials in New Delhi. National Security Adviser Ajit Doval will deliver the opening comments before today’s SCO NSA-level meeting.
According to a source, Pakistan has also chosen to attend the SCO National Security Advisor conference, which is being hosted by India. The form of participation has still to be determined, according to the source. According to sources, Pakistani representatives will also attend the meeting. The next key SCO meeting will be the defence ministers’ meeting, which will be held in Delhi on April 27-29.
The next SCO meet is the Foreign Ministers meet that would be held in Goa on May 4 and 5 and the SCO Summit in July – which is likely to see the participation of heads of states of SCO members. The Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) is an intergovernmental organization established in 2001 and it comprises eight member states, namely, India, China, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Pakistan, Russia, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan.
India became a full member of SCO on 9th June, 2017. There are four Observer States viz Afghanistan, Belarus, Iran and Mongolia and six dialogue partners – Armenia, Azerbaijan, Cambodia, Nepal, Sri Lanka and Turkey. The Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) is a major regional powerhouse that was established over two decades ago with the aim of promoting economic, political, and military cooperation among its member nations.
As India currently holds the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) presidency, it expects all member countries including Pakistan to attend the events under its SCO chairmanship, the Ministry of External Affairs official spokesperson Arindam Bagchi during a press briefing in February. “We hold the current presidency of SCO. As customary, we extend invites to all SCO countries including Pakistan. We expect them all to attend the events,” Bagchi said in response to a question on India’s SCO invite to Pakistan.
“I think Pakistani officials might have attended such events. I don’t know who all have confirmed. We’ll let you know closer to the date,” Bagchi added while speaking during the MEA weekly media briefing. The invitation has been extended to SCO members including the new Foreign Minister of China Qin Gang and Pakistan’s Foreign Minister Bilawal Bhutto Zardari.
India has formally sent invitations to all members of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) including Pakistan and China for the upcoming SCO meeting which will be held in Goa from May 4-5. While the SCO summit is set to take place in Goa this summer, India is holding a host of events leading up to it. Earlier this month, Pakistan also attended the meeting of heads of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) Tourism administrations held in Kashi.
Kazakhstan’s Vice Minister of Culture and Sports Yerzhan Yerkinbayev, China’s Deputy Minister of Culture and Tourism Lu Ying Chuan, Kyrgyzstan’s Deputy Minister of Culture, Information, Sports and Youth Policy Samat Bekturovich Shatmanov and Uzbekistan’s First Deputy Minister of Culture and Tourism Azamov Ulugbek Axmatovich, First Deputy Minister of Culture and Tourism, Uzbekistan in person attended the meeting of heads of the SCO tourism administrations held in Kashi. Meanwhile, Vladimir Evgenyvich Ilyichev, Deputy Minister, Ministry of Economic Development, Russia, Muminzod Kamoliddin, Chairman of the Tourism Development Committee, Tajikistan and Aun Chaudhry, Advisor to the Prime Minister on Tourism and Sports, Pakistan, virtually participated in the SCO meeting held in Kashi earlier this month, according to Tourism Ministry’s press release.