Jaishankar: No India-Pakistan bilateral talks during SCO meet

External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar made it clear on Saturday (October 5) that he won’t hold any bilateral dialogue with Pakistan when he visits Islamabad for the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) meeting.

"It (visit) will be for a multilateral event. I'm not going there to discuss India-Pakistan relations. I'm going there to be a good member of the SCO," he said at an event in New Delhi.

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Pressed further, the minister said: "Since I'm a courteous and civil person, I will behave myself accordingly."

Pakistan blamed for SAARC fiasco

It will be the first visit since 2015 to Pakistan by an Indian external affairs minister. India has refused to hold bilateral dialogues with Pakistan until Islamabad stops backing cross-border terrorism.

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At the same time, Jaishankar blamed Pakistan for the virtual derailment of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC), which has not met for years.

"At the moment SAARC is not moving forward, we haven't had a meeting of SAARC for a very simple reason -- there is one member of SAARC who is practicing cross-border terrorism at least against one more member of SAARC, maybe more,” he said.

Terrorism unacceptable, says Jaishankar

“Terrorism is something which is unacceptable and despite a global view of it if one of our neighbours continues to do it, there cannot be business as usual in SAARC.

“That's the reason why the SAARC meeting has not happened in recent years. But it doesn't mean that the regional activities have stopped. In fact, in the last 5-6 years, we have seen far more regional integration in the Indian subcontinent," he added.

Pakistan is hosting the SCO Council of Heads of Government meeting on October 15-16.